Code: Emma
by eko24
Summary: Emma Kozlov is new to Kadic, privileged with a scholarship. Instead of a normal boarding school experience that she was expecting, she becomes friends with a special group and finds herself thrown into a whole new world that she can barely handle. Will she and her friends defeat this evil that they face? I do not own Code Lyoko but I do own Emma.
1. The New Girl

**N/A So I wrote this for NaNoWriMo. It's done and I am just editing everything. This is kind of a mature plot, there are some brutal chapters and there is mature language all throughout. I hope you all like this! It is not my best obviously because I wrote this in 30 days, but it's definitely not my worst!**

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A girl named Emma Kozlov looked at the sign carved on the gate that would take her to her new school. She liked what she saw, but she was terrified nonetheless. She wondered whether anyone would know Russian or Slovak. She knew Italian fairly well but her French was terrible. Her father squeezed her hand, she shot a brave smile his way and they walked through the gates together, she carrying a backpack of stuff over her shoulder, him carrying a duffel bag of her clothes.

That girl with her father was me, the girl who was transferring to a boarding school mid-semester.

Our first stop was the administrative building. The only problem with that I could barely read the map and my father couldn't read it at all. So extremely lost, we were.

"Why don't you go ask somebody? It would give you a good opportunity to practice your French," my father said in Slovak. I tried desperately once more to read the map and gave in. It sucks being in a foreign language speaking country. I nodded slowly and scanned the grounds. A group of students caught my eye. I could see a Japanese girl and a boy who looked German. Maybe one of them would help her? She walked over to them slow and she blushed as they took notice.

"Hello," said a girl with pink hair with a smile. I felt like I would have a heart attack. I think I said something, something in French, hopefully. I tried to tell them I needed directions.

The boy with a purple spike in his hair, yes, one big spike that defied gravity, stood up. "Can I help you?" he asked me in Italian.

Oops, I was speaking in the wrong language. I felt my cheeks burn brighter and I made some sort of nodding motion while shaking my head at the same time.

"It's okay," he said to me with a friendly smile. "What language do you speak natively?"

"Russian," I replied. "And Slovak."

The German boy smiled. "I speak some Russian," he said to me. "What do you need?"

"I need to get to the administrative building, I'm very lost," I said to him in Russian. I tried to speak slowly just in case he needed me to. He nodded in understanding.

"I'll take you there," he said, standing and I beckoned for my father to join us. The brunette led my father and me to the building we needed. We were greeted by a Translator and I waved goodbye and thank you to the boy, who smiled and left to go back to his friends.

"He seemed like a nice boy," my father noted. "They all seemed to be kind to you."

Principal Delmas emerged from his office just then and shook my father's hand. With little effort we finalized my registration and Principal Delmas handed me a schedule, he said I would be put in the ninth grade, because my academic scores were off the charts. He said I would participate in French lessons to strengthen my communication. My father had to leave after the meeting and I gave him the longest hug of my life, feeling as if I would lose a life preserver.

I wanted this; I wanted to come to France for my education. I could do this without him, I knew it, but it was still very hard. After my mother died four years prior, we'd been inseparable.

Principal Delmas offered to show me to my new dorm, saying that I had my own room. The last single room he had to offer. He led me through the campus and I saw the boys who had helped me before. They waved and I smiled and waved back, making a mental note to find them later on and thank them again for helping me.

The Principal showed me to my room. He turned to me just outside my door. "I hope you feel welcome here, Kadic is very lucky to have you." He said it to me in French slowly. I nodded my understanding.

"Thank you very much for having me," I replied. He smiled and left, handing me a key before he left. I assumed it was for the door. I let myself into my room and dropped the duffel bag and backpack on my bed.

The room was small; there was a desk, an armoire with drawers, and a bed built into the wall. New blankets, sheets, and pillow cases were folded neatly at the end of the bed. The walls were a plain white and there was a small window overlooking the school behind the desk. I liked it; it was perfect for what I needed. It was also right across the hallway from the bathroom and showers, which is what I really needed – a shower.

Before coming to France, my father and I had visited relatives in Slovakia, and I didn't have a chance to take a sufficient shower while I was there. I felt really bad; they lived in the lower class part of Slovakia. In Russia things weren't much different. We lived in small family apartments with at least two extended family members at a time. It was never an unhappy place to live; it just wasn't a lucrative environment. If I'd stayed there I knew I would just end up living that way for the rest of my life, which didn't seem ideal.

I had spent the greater part of my life studying to earn a scholarship to this school. I knew that I would have a better chance to get a good education to get a good paying job eventually so that I can help my family out of poverty.

The beginning of my life was a happy one, says my father. I don't remember much of it but before my mother got sick, while they both had jobs, they were able to support all of us. When my mother became ill when I was five, she had to stop working and life changed for all of us. We lived in Russia at the time with her family, but when she died when I was ten, my father and I felt like we were intruding on them, so he worked to get us into our own small studio apartment, and then he worked to get us to Slovakia to visit his family before I came here.

I dug through my duffel bag to find an old towel and some new clothes. Luckily in the shower room, there were body wash/shampoo dispensers. I took the warmest, most amazing shower of my life. For most of it I kind of just stood there, soaking up the hot water. I jumped and squeaked suddenly when the water chilled. I turned it off and blushed, realizing that the warm water wasn't infinite.

I dried myself off and put on fresh clothes. I washed my face in the bathroom sink and brushed my teeth. When I turned to walk back to my room there was a black haired girl eyeing me from the door.

"Who are you?" she asked in quick French.

"My name is Emma," I replied. Thank god I knew this much. "And you?"

"I am Sissi Delmas, the principal's daughter! Where are you from?"

"Russia," I said. I hoped she wouldn't inquire further because I didn't know much more French. "Please, excuse me.:

I tried to squeeze around her and barely managed to get past her when she grabbed my arm, turning me around in the hallway. "Where are you running to?"

I just looked at her, feeling the blood rush to my face. "I… I…" She raised an eye brow and gave me an irritated look.

"What are you, stupid?" she asked. "You don't know how to talk or what?"

"Sissi!" A girl yelled from down the hallway. I looked to see the Japanese girl and the pink haired girl storming up to us. The Japanese girl pulled me away from Sissi and the other girl just glared at her. "Lay off, she's not used to French!"

At this point I could only understand snippets. After a minute of back and forth, Sissi stormed back into the bathroom.

"Thank you very much," I said to them.

"What is your name?" The Japanese girl asked with a smile.

"I am Emma Kozlov," I said.

"My name is Yumi Ishiyama, and her name is Aelita Stones," she said. She pointed to herself and Aelita as she said their names.

"It's nice to meet you, Emma," Aelita said.

I nodded, smiled. "It's nice to meet you two, as well."

"We'll leave you alone now, if Sissi tries to bother you again, just ignore her," Yumi said. With that, the two girls walked into another dorm room down the hall. I made a mental note of which one it was just in case I needed their help with something else.

I walked into my room, dropping onto the bed. I took a deep breath and gave myself a small pep talk. "You will get used to it here; this place will be very good for you." I said to myself. "You'll make friends here, you'll learn to speak French better…"

With that I got up and unpacked. I didn't have much, just some clothes, photographs, a small amount of money, and a few Educational leaflets on France. I decided to read through them a few times and practice French on my own before I went back out to the grounds.

I looked at the clock that the school provided for me and saw that it was time for dinner. I pocketed the most useful leaflet and came to the conclusion that now was as good a time as any to show my face.

I opened the door of the armoire to look at the mirror inside. I thought I looked presentable; My hair was drying quickly because of how short it was: just barely shoulder length. It was a copper orange color and it flowed out away from my face. My green eyes were round and as anxious as ever. I was wearing a simple red-orange hoodie and a pair of jeans. My dad had bought me a new outfit for my first day here. My shoes were the same, ratty old sneakers that I'd been wearing for two years. I figured they would last a little while longer before I had to buy new shoes. I smiled at my reflection and closed the armoire door.

Before leaving my room, I locked it up and put the key in my shoe. I walked down the steps and out of the dormitory building and located the building nearby that the Principal had pointed out as the cafeteria. I walked in to find there were already a lot of people in line. I got a tray and followed the line through, mimicking other students, picking up side dishes until I reach a large cafeteria lady.

"Lasagna or spaghetti and meatballs?" she asked with a smile. I made my choice and left the line.

Now came the hard part, finding a table to sit at. I knew that just sitting with a random group would be a bad idea, but I couldn't find an empty table anywhere.

Someone tapped me on the shoulder and I jumped. I turned to see the boy with a purple spot in his hair balancing a loaded tray of food with one hand. He smiled. "Hi, how is your day going?" he asked me in Italian.

"It's going alright," I replied. "Your friends saved me from a mean girl earlier… Aelita and Yumi?"

"Let me guess. This mean girl had black hair and bragged about being the principal's daughter?" he asked, smirking. "Yeah you will get used to her. Would you like to sit at my table? We have an extra seat."

I nodded, relieved that the hardest part of eating dinner was overcome. I followed the boy to a table next to the windows. I saw Yumi and the German boy already sitting there. I sat down and they stopped talking and waved hello to me.

Aelita showed up then, with another boy I hadn't seen yet. "Emma, this is Jeremie Belpois, he was hiding in his room earlier so you haven't seen him yet. His name is Ulrich Stern, in case he didn't already tell you, and I'm Odd," the spiky haired boy said to me in Italian. "Odd Della Robbia."

"Pleased to meet you," Jeremie said. I nodded.

"Thank you all for being so nice," I said to them. "I promise I'm not as helpless as I probably seem."

Ulrich and Odd laughed at that, finding it funny. "We know. And we understand, being in a foreign country can be hard," Ulrich assured me.

"I'm going to practice my French so we can all talk together without confusion," I said. I said it in French, and apparently I got it right.

Score One for the Russian.

"So you're from Russia?" Ulrich asked in French.

"My mother was Russian, and my father is Slovakian," I explained.

"Was?" Odd asked and frowned.

"She passed away from an illness four years ago. Its fine," I assure him. "She suffered much too long and now she isn't."

Odd nodded. We all stayed quiet for a little while. We ate our food and then I heard a beeping sound coming from Jeremie's back pack. I looked at it, and then looked at him. He scowled and pulled a laptop out of the bag, opening it. Everyone was looking at him expectantly.

"Hey, Emma, I'm sorry but Jeremie, Aelita, Ulrich, and I need to go work on a project. Will you be fine hanging out with Yumi?" Odd asked me. He glanced at Yumi and she nodded. The four of them stood up, discarding their trays as they left the cafeteria. I watched them leave, confusion written all over my face.

"So, Emma, what kind of stuff do you like to do?" Yumi asked calmly. She took a bite of her spaghetti and looked at me, waiting for an answer.

"Um, well I like to take photographs," I said to her slowly. We were getting into uncomfortable territory. My French vocabulary didn't stretch very far. I knew how to say this only because I'd looked the particular phrase up.

"Oh, that's great. Photography is cool," Yumi responded. She obviously sensed my discomfort. "Sorry that I can't talk to you in a language you're more familiar with."

"It's okay. I hope soon I will be more fluent in French." I finished off the last bite of my food and chugged the last of my beverage. "Anyway, I'm going back to my room. I will see you another time."

I threw my trash away and discarded the tray and left the cafeteria, making a run for the dormitory building. I climbed the steps two at a time and reached my floor, rushing to my room I locked myself in and tried to even out my breathing.

Why did I run away? Yumi was willing to just sit with me, I could tell. I kicked the door lightly, next time I would just stay calm. I did feel a little abandoned; I felt as thought Ulrich and Odd were the only two who I could really talk to. Aelita and Yumi were very nice, but it was harrder to talk to them because of the language barrier. I really regretted not practicing more of my French before I left Slovakia.

The truth was that I'd practiced nonstop for months; the problem was how nervous I was. I walked over to my bed and extracted a journal from my backpack. Just then a flash of light erupted from nowhere.


	2. Replay

**A/N I forgot to put this in the last Author's notes... I do not own Code Lyoko. I do own this plot and Emma.**

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I looked up at the gates of Kadic Academy, feeling a sense of déjà vu. Of course that was ridiculous; this was my first time looking at the campus up close. Of course it was possible I felt the déjà vu because of the brochure that I've had my eyes glued to for the past hour and a half. My father squeezed my hand and we walked through the gates. First we had to find the administrative building.

"Why don't you go ask somebody? It would give you a good opportunity to practice your French," My father suggested. I nodded and found myself drawn to a group of kids, gathered at a bench. They seemed to notice me at the same time. I walked over and fumbled with my words as I tried to ask for directions. Too late, I realized that I'd asked in Italian.

A blonde boy with a thing for purple stood up along with a brunette. "You're new here, I can tell," the blonde said in Italian. "What is your native language?"

"Russian and Slovak," I resplied. The brunette smiled.

"Let us take you to the administrative building," he said in Russian. "You'll love Kadic."

I followed the boys to the Administrative building with my dad. They offered to be translators for me and my dad, and the person who was meant to be the translator agreed and left. I did the last bit of registration that I needed to do and the principal handed me my schedule. He said something to the boys and they turned to me.

"He asked us if we would teach you French," the blonde said. "Is that okay with you?"

I nodded slowly. I started to get the feeling that we would be good friends. "Yes, I would love that."

The principal and the two boys took me on a small tour of the campus after my father left. They showed me to my dorm and the principal left the three of us to go back to his office.

"By the way," the blonde started. He pointed to himself and grinned. "I'm Odd, Odd Della Robbia."

"And I'm Ulrich Stern, our room is upstairs, if you need us, and our friend's room is right over there," the brunette said, pointing to a dorm three doors down. "Hopefully you adjust here quickly."

I opened the door to my room and Ulrich and Odd handed me my luggage and I set my stuff down on my bed. The boys left and I closed the door behind them and started unpacking a clean shirt and pants, and grabbed my towel and went to take a shower before I unpacked.

The shower was wonderful, the encounter with a mean girl afterward, was not. I found myself in the hallway looking at a menacingly forward black haired girl who talked at me in rapid French.

"Sissi, go away," came a voice from down the hallway. I looked to see the two girls who had been hanging out with Odd and Ulrich earlier.

After the girls saved me from Sissi, I thanked them and intended to go back into my room them but they stopped me.

"So what's your name?" The Asian girl asked. When I told her, she introduced herself as Yumi and introduced the pink haired girl as Aelita.

When I went into my room finally I unpacked and studied my educational French leaflets until it was time for dinner, then I gathered my courage and went to the cafeteria alone, getting in line and getting spaghetti and meatballs for my main dish.

A tap on my shoulder; It was Odd, he offered to let me sit with him and his friends and I accepted.

I still had the déjà vu feeling from earlier, usually that kind of feeling only lasted a few seconds, and not all day I found that I could talk to these people pretty easily. They introduced me to another member of their group, his name was Jeremie and apparently he liked computers.

"So, Emma," Odd said suddenly. "Would you like me to start with your French lesson? We can do it in your room, or we can go sit outside."

I thought about that. "Can we do it in my room? I still feel a little self-conscious." Then I remembered something, or I thought I did. "Did you say you had to do a project or something?" I asked. I wasn't sure if he had said anything like that or not.

He was silent for a minute, "uh, no? We don't have any project right now."

I shrugged. "Okay, forgive me. I just feel a little weird, like I have a sense of déjà vu. It's crazy because this is my first day here…"

Ulrich nodded. "I get a weird sense of déjà vu too sometimes, I think everyone does. Don't worry about it."

When we were all done eating, Ulrich and Yumi went to the gym to practice martial arts, and Jeremie and Aelita went for a walk in a nearby park.

"Pencak Silat," I tried to pronounce. It was the kind of martial arts that Ulrich and Yumi were practicing.

"Yeah. I practice too sometimes, you should try it," Odd said as we walked together to the dorm building. We talked for a little while longer before we reached my room. I unlocked the door and let him in first. He stood in the middle of the room, seeming unsure of where to sit down. I sat down on the bed and crossed my legs. I motioned for him to sit anywhere.

"So, let's start your lesson, hopefully I can teach you this properly," he said. He sat down next to me on the bed and we done into the lesson. He gave me written lessons but most of them were just spoken. "Ulrich and Jeremie can help you with the written stuff," he'd said when I questioned him on that. When the time came for him to leave, I felt much more secure in my French.

That night I slept well, knowing that in the morning when I woke up, I would have friends in the morning.


	3. Spotting Trouble

When I woke up in the morning it was still quite early. I pulled on my orange hoodie and grabbed my class schedule, hoping to find my classes before school started. Thanks to the tour that Odd and Ulrich had given me the day before, I found my classes easily. I decided that I would take a walk through the park to kill time before breakfast.

"Arf!" I must have jumped ten feet when I heard it. I looked around to see a dog running full speed to me. I tried stepping over so the small dog wouldn't collide with me but it did and I fell on my butt before I knew it. I looked at the dog, waging its tail happily panting. It started sniffing me and licked my hand before going over to a tree and doing its business.

"Kiwi!" Odd's voice called from a short distance. I looked to see where he was and saw he was running toward me. He saw me on the ground and grimaced. "Kiwi! Tell me you didn't knock Emma over!"

I laughed, finding it cute that he was talking to his dog as if he could respond. Odd stopped in front of me and held out his hand to help me up. "I'm sorry about my dog. Sometimes he can get overly excited when I take him outside in the morning.

I took his hand and he pulled me up. He continued by asking me to keep Kiwi a secret and I agreed.

"It's not my business… Why don't you leave Kiwi at home though? Wouldn't he be happier there?" I asked him as we started walking together in the park.

"No, he likes me best out of everyone in my family, my sisters would have forgotten to take care of him," Odd explained. "And they don't understand how delicate he is when it comes to eating so it was safer for me to bring him here."

I nodded. "I've always wanted a dog; they seem to make very good pets."

The night before I had given Odd a summed up version of my life's story and he'd given me his. So he understood why I was never able to have a dog growing up. "Well whenever you want to pretend that you own a dog, you can come to my room and play with Kiwi," he said to me and Kiwi barked his approval and wagged his tail. I leaned down to pet the happy dog before he scampered away to explore some more.

Finally, Odd called to Kiwi and he jumped into Odd's bag and we took him back to Odd's room. He invited me in to relax for a few minutes before breakfast and I entered to find Ulrich digging through his armoire to find clothes. He was only wearing boxers.

"Oh!" I exclaimed. Ulrich whipped his head toward the door and his eyes widened. He quickly pulled on a pair of pants he was clutching while I proceeded to turn bright red.

"You sure do go from normal skin tone to red pretty quickly," Odd speculated.

"Maybe if you would take a look in here before inviting her in, she wouldn't do that, huh?" Ulrich retorted. He pulled on a shirt and found his shoes underneath his desk. "So how was your first real French lesson last night?" he asked me in Russian.

"It was pretty good," I said in French. "Odd stuck you and Jeremie with focusing on writing, if that's okay."

Ulrich rolled his eyes. "I'll let Jeremie help you with writing. If I taught you how to write in French you'd be doomed."

I laughed. "So Jeremie, does he know any languages beside French?"

Odd shook his head. "He's a whiz at French but he stinks at other languages. Same thing goes for Aelita. Yumi knows Japanese, some Chinese, and knows French obviously."

"And you?" I asked. "You're just the linguistics master, are you?"

"Italian, French, some Chinese, and some Japanese. So compared to all of you…" he trailed off, grinning.

"Bet you can't learn Slovak and Russian," I said to him in Russian. "They're some of the hardest to learn," I continued in Slovak. Ulrich smirked and Odd's grin fell into a confused frown and then he rolled his eyes.

"Fine, let's make a deal, I keep teaching you French if you teach me Slovak or Russian," he offered. I thought about it and agreed.

The three of us went down to the cafeteria then and got breakfast. I noticed for the first time how much food Odd had compared to the rest of us. He had four pieces of toast, two croissants, two bananas, and a hot chocolate. Everyone had some kind of smaller variation of that.

"Geez, Odd. Feeding an army?" I asked.

"Him and his ego," Yumi laughed.

"But you're so…" Odd shot me a look. "Scrawny," I finished. Ulrich smirked.

"Svelte!" Odd corrected. "Not scrawny!"

Jeremie and Aelita joined us then and said their hellos. I asked Jeremie if he would mind doing a french lesson during lunch and he said he'd love to when he had time to spare. A dark shadow formed behind me and I looked to see it was Sissi and two boys flanking her on each side.

"So, new girl, are you adjusting well?" she asked sweetly. I nodded, unsure of what to expect from her.

"Good, do you know how to speak yet?" she asked. "You know, full sentences? In French?" she added icily.

I looked at her and cleared my throat deliberately. "Sissi, I don't understand why you're such a rude person. You know maybe you should focus less on me and focus more on yourself. Work to better yourself instead of attacking me because, truth be told, it seems like you need a lot more work than I do. And also, my name is Emma, not 'new girl.'"

Ulrich snickered. "See, Sissi? Even Emma can see that you aren't perfect and shehasn't even had the displeasure of being around you for that long."

Sissi glared at us and stormed off. "So that's how you get rid of her? If only I'd known yesterday," I said, chuckling.

"So what class do you have first, Emma?" Aelita asked me, taking a sip of her orange juice.

"I have math with Mrs. Meyer." I told her. Odd whooped loudly and clapped his hands together.

"You're in our class! I forgot to ask you yesterday."

The first few classes went smoothly, I was able to understand most of my teachers and they excused me from any of the school work that I didn't understand. Math was my best class; math stayed the same in every language. Sure I didn't understand what everything was called but I understood it when it was written on the board and I understood it in the textbook.

When it came for lunch Odd told me that they would meet me at the table, so I went ahead and got my lunch and sat down. After fifteen minutes of waiting I decided to go and look for my friends.

I spotted Yumi by the the path leading to the park, she was fighting somebody and she looked like she was in trouble. I acted upon instinct; I charged for her attacker and body slammed them before they could hurt her.

"Emma!" Yumi cried. "Emma run, get away from here!"

I looked up at her in confusion before I was catapulted off of the ground by an electrical charge. I screamed in midair until I slammed into a tree and blacked out.


	4. Virtualization

I woke up with a pounding headache and felt my back was sore. I wasn't outside anymore though. I was in a dark room. I looked around to see an elevator next to me and a computer in front of me. A groan escaped my lips and Jeremie's head popped out around the computer to look at me.

"Emma! How do you feel? Yumi said you were slammed into a tree pretty hard."

I looked at him, confused and then I remembered. Yumi had been fighting somebody off on the outskirts of the school grounds… near the park.

"I feel fine," I told him, hiding the struggle that I had standing up. "Where is Yumi?"

"Wow, usually the first question is 'where am I?'" Jeremie mused, returning his attention to the computer screen. I walked over to where he sat and took a look at what he was doing. I saw multiple screens and player cards on the screen. I saw a photo of Odd in a cat costume, Ulrich in a sleek yellow and brown body suit, Yumi in a sleep pink and purple body suit, and Aelita in a bright pink cyber elf costume.

"A video game?" I guessed. "I don't have a lot of experience with video games, so I'm not sure."

"No, you're sort of right. It is a virtual world where the four of our friends go to save the real world," Jeremie explained. I pursed my lips, looking at him skeptically. He caught my glance. "It's called Lyoko."

I shook my head. "But…" I thought about it and couldn't think of a good argument other than the fact that it sounded like it was science fictional. I had no way of proving that something like this couldn't exist.

Out of nowhere the man that Yumi had been fighting came down from the rafters above, growling at Jeremie and I. I gasped and Jeremie quickly informed his friends that X.A.N.A. 's spectre was in the room.

The spectre's hands began to glow as a ball of electrified energy appeared. He took aim at Jeremie and before he had a chance to fire it t him, I took my shoe off and threw it at him. It was something my great aunt told me to do in a time like this; an attacker won't expect you to use a shoe as a weapon.

"Hey! Leave my friend alone!" I yelled in Russian. The "spectre" as Jeremie called it before, locked eyes with me and I thought I saw what looked like a target with three lines sticking out at the bottom and one line on top, in the center. I braced myself to fight and just then the man shot a surge of electricity at me and suspended me in the air. I howled in pain until suddenly it stopped. I collapsed on the ground to see the man on the ground, Odd standing behind him holding a metal pipe.

"Jeremie, there's still a few monsters there and I don't know if Ulrich, Yumi, and Aelita will make it," Odd informed him as he ran over to me. I looked up at him, totally terrified out of my mind, my heart was racing.

"That man shot lightning at me!" I sputtered. "The fuck!?"

"Are you okay?" Odd asked anxiously. I stood up, a little fuzzy but I felt fine.

"I feel fine. Do you need me to go into Lyoko to help them?" I asked them. "If they aren't going to make it? We can't let this terror hurt anyone else." I kicked the man and felt him grunt and try to grab at me.

Odd tackled the man and led him into the elevator and closed the door on him. He looked at me and then at Jeremie frantically.

"Yumi's coming back!" Jeremie yelled. "And Ulrich is surrounded… Oh man!"

I stood next to him and tapped him on the shoulder. "Let me go to Lyoko to help!"

Jeremie shook his head. "They can make it…" He said. I wasn't sure if even he believed that sounded convincing.

"Jeremie, just scan her and let her help us! We're dying out here!" Ulrich yelled from the game. "She can distract the monsters at least; the worst that can happen is she'll get devirtualized!"

Odd pointed me to a hole in the floor where I saw a ladder. And I am going to go keep twinkle fingers busy," he told me as I passed him. I climbed down the ladder and immediately spotted three tubes. Yumi was getting out of one, looking at me suspiciously, she looked a little disoriented.

"So, should I just stand inside one of these?" I called up to Jeremie. Yumi's eyes narrowed but she didn't say anything to me.

"Yes. Stand inside and I'll scan you," Jeremie explained. His voice rang out over speeakers that were located around the room. "Take a minute to find your weapons and get a feel for them before you join the others."

I did as he said and stepped into the scanner on the left hand side of the room. "Transfer: Emma." I heard Jeremie's voice as the scanner closed around me. I tried with all my might to remain calm. I didn't realize I'd be trapped in such a small space…

"Scanner: Emma," Jeremie said. A bright light shined and I felt my body tingle slightly as everything went black for a microsecond.

"Virtualization."

When I opened my eyes I was in what appeared to be a mountain environment. I looked down and, too late, I realized I wasn't on the ground. I fell and landed smack dab on my butt.

"Emma, can you hear me?" Jeremie's rang out from above. I looked up to see if I could see him, but no, there was just a foggy blue sky. I stood up and took a look at myself.

"Uh, yeah I hear you," I said, distracted. I was wearing a sleek, metallic orange corset with a dark red, tutu skirt. Both had intricate black chrome designs that mimicked that of a spider web. I was bare other than a pair of orange combat boots with red stripes running down the side of the boot and a pair of red gloves that came to my elbow, the gloves had the same black design as on the corset and skirt. I looked in the palm of my hand to see a small barrel built into my hand, like the barrel of a gun.

"Jeremie, I seem to have some sort of gun built into my hand. How do I use it?"

"If it's like Odd's laser arrows, all you need to do it think about shooting, concentrate, aim, and it will fire. Try that, see if it works." Jeremie suggested.

I did just that. I targeted a nearby tree and aimed my hand, palm forward and thought of firing. A laser bullet flashed and the next thing I knew, a tree branch shattered and pieces of virtual bark fell into a sort of digital sea.

"Jeremie, is that sea below me safe?" I asked as I looked down at it.

"Avoid it. If you fall in, it's game over," Jeremie said frankly. "Ulrich's just been devirtualized and Aelita is alone, are you ready?"

"I think I can do this… where should I go?" I asked him.

Jeremie directed me to Aelita and I found her hiding in a casing of rock. She was like a pistachio nut that was still incased in a shell. She was surrounded by a giant crab monster, a block monster, and two small bug-like monsters.

"So I hit them in the thing that looks like a target? Seems easy enough…" I said. I hid behind a rock and stuck my hand out, palm forward and aimed for the block first since it had the most targets.

The block moved just as I fired, but I still hit the target. The block exploded and the other monsters looked in my direction to see what attacked their comrade. I sprung out from behind the rock and sent a bullet flying at one of the smaller monsters and missed. I took another shot, barely evading a laser from the crab. This time I hit the target on the bug's face.

The second bug charged a laser and fired at me. I was hit and felt a brief pain but it faded quickly. I ran around back to the rock and climbed up, finding that my fingers were especially abrasive and made it easy for me to climb. I looked over the top and quickly brought my head back down behind the rock before a laser whizzed just above me. The giant crab was just in front of therock.

"Aren't you supposed to be behind a glass window at a super market?" I sneered, launching myself up and over the rock. I landed shakily on top of the crab and pressed my hand into its shell. "laser!" I shouted. A flash of light and I knew I had to get away. I jumped off and landed flat on my ass, watching the beast explode.

"You're doing great Emma!" Jeremie praised. Just as he said it, the last of the monsters, the bug that had hit me before, shot me with another laser. I moved from my butt and got up on my knees, taking quick aim at the monster and shot a curved laser bullet at it. It shattered on impact. I scanned the vicinity and got up. I approached Aelita's safe place, as I walked the rock separated and Aelita stepped out, grinning wide.

"You did so great! Please. Excuse me," she said. She walked over to a large tower structure that glowed red toward the top. I didn't see a door or any way for her to enter, but that didn't stop her. She sort of just passed through the solid wall, arms outstretched to her sides. I watched carefully, wanting to see what would happen next.

The tower's red glow faded to a white haze and Aelita's voice rang throughout the mountains. "Tower: Deactivated."

"Jeremie, I think she just did it?" I announced. "Is that what she was supposed to do?"

"Yes," Jeremie said simply. I could hear Yumi's voice in the background, she didn't sound very happy.

Aelita came out of the tower a few seconds later and walked over to me. "So, this tower is how this… X.A.N.A. got that man to attack Yumi earlier?" I asked her, looking at the once red topped tower. Now it had a neutral haze surrounding it instead.

"That's right," Aelita said to me. "Now it is inactive, so it isn't doing anything, but when X.A.N.A. activates one he can connect to the real world to attack it. It is usually a different attack each time. I am the only one who can deactivate the towers."

"Aelita, Emma, I am going to bring you home now. We all need to talk," Jeremie's voice boomed over them. A second later I watched as Aelita pixilated and disappeared. A second later, the same thing happened to me.

The scanner opened and I nearly fell out. Odd and Ulrich caught me before I could completely collapse.

"Yeah, the first time felt like this for me too," Odd said soothingly. "If it makes you feel better, I didn't have anyone to catch me."

I shook my head. "That doesn't make me feel better," I told him but smiled nonetheless. "So what do we need to talk about?"

The boys led me and Aelita upstairs where Jeremie and Yumi both stood, waiting for us.

"I can't believe you guys let her go to Lyoko just like that," Yumi said immediately, scowling at me. "It was really risky. I thought if I brought her here, we'd just let her rest until we did a return to the past…"

"So what's the big deal? I did well, didn't I?" I asked. I could feel my heart racing. I couldn't tell whether or not they were mad at me. Jeremie looked perplexed, Odd and Ulrich looked concerned, along with Aelita. Yumi was the only one who seemed annoyed. But why?

"This whole operation is highly… confidential," Jeremie began. "we've never let an outside person onto Lyoko, and we've discussed it and what we would have done in any other situation is have a group vote. Because of the situation though, we had to send you in before we discussed it. So we have to discuss it now."

I nodded, "I understand… Can you guys explain what all of this is about? From beginning to end?" I asked them. I sat down on the floor next to the opening to the scanner room and Odd sat down next to me. Ulrich and Aelita just remained standing, looking down at me. I hated when everyone looked at me all at once…. It made me feel ultra-aware of what I was doing and how I was moving.

So they explained everything, starting with the day that Jeremie came to the factory to find parts for a robot, but instead found Aelita trapped in Lyoko. They continued by regaling me with how they freed Aelita and the complications they're facing with shutting the computer off. So now they were all just trying to keep X.A.N.A. at bay while they figure out a way to destroy him. During various parts of the story Odd and Ulrich had to translate for me. Finally, when they were done, I found it all really hard to believe.

"Um, so it all sounds really crazy; like a science fiction novel… I wouldn't be able to believe it if I hadn't just lived it," I said in all honesty. My heart was still racing, and my mind was cluttered with everything they'd just told me. I made my decision: "I won't tell anybody, and I would like to help you to defeat X.A.N.A.," I said to them. "If you will have me," I added quickly. Odd grinned, looking at Jeremie and Yumi, waiting for an answer.

"I saw how she fought; it was a little shaky but she stayed calm, even when that Kankralat knocked her down. I think she'd be a valuable addition to our team if we teach her how to fight outside of Lyoko first," Ulrich said, offering his input.

"It's true; she took out a Blok, a Krab, and two Roachsters all on her own with next to no background information." Aelita added.

"It would be nice to have a fourth warrior. We could get the towers deactivated faster," came Odd's input.

Yumi looked hard at me, our eyes locked and she looked like she was searching my soul. After a minute she looked away, crossing her arms. My heard sank before she opened her mouth. "She can join us as long as Jeremie is on board."

We all looked at Jeremie. He nodded. "So, it's time for a return to the past. Emma, get ready to relive your first day of classes."


	5. Because I Like You

Two weeks went by at Kadic and Emma seemed to be getting used to her new life in France. Odd and Ulrich gave her French lessons every night and Jeremie and Aelita helped her to understand and complete her homework. It came time for Odd and Ulrich to start teaching her Pencak Silat.

"What should we show her first?" Odd asked his best friend Ulrich before Emma was due to arrive in the gym. It was right after dinner and Odd had a lot of energy to burn before he was ready to go back to their dorm room.

"I was thinking we would give her a demonstration and then just explain the basic principles of silat martial arts in general," Ulrich replied. "Structure, focus, and balancing of power and emotion."

"She picked up on French pretty quickly, she might breeze through learning Pencak Silat too," Odd pointed out. "Maybe we can see if she can do some basic moves tonight?"

Ulrich shrugged. "Sure. I mean teaching her the physical principles won't take long."

Emma showed up just then and Odd smiled, she looked cute even when she was wearing gym clothes and had her hair up. She smiled when she saw Odd and Ulrich sitting on the bleachers and approached them.

"I hope I didn't need to bring anything…" She said softly. Her Russian accent making her French sound really… exotic. "I wore my P.E. clothes like you said to."

"That's great, Emma. You're all ready to learn how to kick ass!" Odd told her enthusiastically. He jumped up to his feet and Ulrich followed suit. Odd bounded down the bleachers and Ulrich rolled his eyes.

"Calm down Odd," Ulrich said. "Emma, take a seat. We're going to give you a demonstration of Pencak Silat and then I'll tell you some of the physical principles you need to keep in mind before you start."

Odd and Ulrich stood in the middle of the gym and waited for Emma to situate herself.

"Two minutes," Ulrich told Odd. Odd nodded and the two bowed.

When the two were done, Odd was panting. "So, Emma, you can either be a dirty fighter like Ulrich, or you can fight with integrity, like me," he said to her.

"You should just try to focus when you fight. You're too involved in showing off to be affective," Ulrich retorted.

Odd's jaw dropped, he was at a loss for words. He glared at Ulrich for half a second before clearing his face of the irritation. He walked over to Emma and sat down next to her. "Okay, Ulrich… talk about the principles."

"So, Emma, when you're practicing Pencak Silat you need to make sure your structure is uncompromised; your posture needs to be strong," Ulrich began. "Another thing you need to think about is your focus and emotions; you need to keep your mind clear and tune out of anything that might distract you. The last big thing you need to think about is maintaining your power levels, you don't need to use all of your power in an attack. Usually if you try to do that, you're focusing too much on the attack and not enough on the defense." Ulrich continued to explain these principles in more detail, giving examples.

Emma nodded. "So should I start practice any simple moves?"

"Yes," Odd said quickly. He jumped back up and motioned for her to follow. "I'm going to show you some simple moves and we'll see how well you can do them."

The rest of the training session was filled with Odd showing Emma basic stances and defensive moves. Emma practiced them and memorized the movement. Odd offered to walk with her back to the dormitory building and she accepted, wiping her forehead with her sleeve.

"Are you feeling okay?" Odd asked her, seeing she was really flushed. She looked like she'd just run ten miles.

"It's nothing, lets go," Emma replied. Odd gave Ulrich one last worried look before following her out of the gym.

"So did you like that lesson?" Odd asked her as they walked. The cool air seemed to be making her feel better and she looked a lot calmer than she'd been inside.

"It's hard work. I've never been very athletic but I think with practice I'll be able to do it," Emma replied. "Back home, my dad was a police man. He wanted to teach me self-defense but he never had the chance to do that after my mother died. We were both working all the time."

"I can't imagine how tough that would be…" Odd mused. He realized more and more how lucky he was. His family always had plenty of money to support him and all of his sisters. He knew that Jeremie's family had money as well, Yumi's family did alright and so did Ulrich's. "It seems like you need to have a lot of money if you're going to be comfortable in this world…" he muttered thoughtfully.

"Well that depends on your idea of comfortable," Emma replied. "I'm comfortable. I have clothes, I'm here, with shelter, food, and education, and I have friends. What else does a person need?"

When the two of them reached Emma's room they sat down on her bed like they'd been doing all week. She sat cross legged and he sat the same way right across from her. Their knees always touched. Every night they did this and just talked; Odd asked her about herself and Emma did the same for him. The more Odd talked to her, the more he liked being around her.

"So can I ask you something?" Emma asked Odd when they sat down. "Why is it you were trying to impress me tonight?"

Odd was taken aback, he thought of his sparring with Ulrich and recalled Ulrich's remark about how he was far too focused on showing off. He examined his shoes, wondering if this would be the right time to tell her.

"Emma, I'm trying to impress you because…" She was watching him closely now. She was twirling a strand of her copper colored hair, her usual light smile dancing on her lips. She always looked like she was smiling despite her troubled past. "Because I like you."

Emma's brow creased then, thinking. She always looked so intense when she thought. Odd waited anxiously for her to respond, bracing himself for the rejection he usually got. He always liked to say he had a way with women, but that's a lot easier to say than admitting he was usually clueless when he tried to understand the female mind.

"So… what would you like to do about that?" she asked thoughtfully. "I've never been in any sort of relationship like this."

"Well, I've been wanting to do this," Odd said. He leaned forward and kissed her swiftly on the mouth. When he pulled away she looked shocked. He couldn't tell whether or not it was a good thing or bad thing.

After a minute Emma smiled. "I liked that," she said plainly. "I loved it, actually. Thank you."

Odd smiled, feeling his heart soar. "Emma, you're such a sweetheart! No need to thank me, the pleasure was all mine, really."

Emma nodded and yawned. "So, are we going to go out?"

"Do you want to?" Odd asked her, not wanting her to feel like he was calling any shots. It was always up to her.

"I would like to try… I mean I do like you," Emma said with a tone of resolution. She leaned forward and kissed him then, a sweet, timid kiss. He took her head in his hands and kissed her back.

At that moment, there was a knock at the door and Aelita burst in. Emma pulled away suddenly, her face burning red.

"X.A.N.A. has activated a tower!" Aelita panted. "We've been trying to reach you two."

Odd checked his phone and realized it was dead. Emma lowered her head slightly.

"I'm sorry I don't have any way to stay in contact with you all," she said softly. "But let's go. What is X.A.N.A. doing?"

"X.A.N.A. has gained control of the controls of two cargo trucks and set them on a collision course for the power plant. There are highly reactive and toxic chemicals in both of the trucks and if they both collide with the plant it would mean a nuclear explosion that would wipe out not only France but Italy and parts of other surrounding countries!" Odd didn't waste any more time, he jumped up grasping Emma's arm he ran out of her room with the girls on his heels.

"How long do we have?" Odd asked Aelita.

"About an hour before they collide if they keep going the speed they are right now."

"Emma, are you ready for this?" he asked her.

"If you're leading the way I am ready," she panted. Odd felt a whole new surge of adoration for her but repressed it.

He had to focus.

When the three of them reached the factory Ulrich and Yumi were already on Lyoko.

"Hurry and get to the scanners! Both trucks have picked up speed and they are going as fast as their structure will allow. We have half an hour!" Jeremie called to them as Odd pressed the elevator button again to go down to the scanners.

They each stepped into a scanner and Jeremie started a speedy transfer. "Transfer…" Jeremie started. Odd clenched his fist, it's go time, he thought. He looked over at Emma who looked like she was determined as well.


	6. Holiday Preparations

When the three of us were finally virtualized onto Lyoko, I looked around to see we were in a forest now. "Jeremie, where are the others?" I asked.

"About face," Odd said suddenly and I turned around just in time to see a Tarantula approach me.

Behind the beast, Yumi and Ulrich were busy with three tarantulas of their own. I gritted my teeth, stepping away from the tarantula. "You know, you're pretty damn ugly," I shouted at it as I pointed and took aim for X.A.N.A.'s eye. "Laser!"

The beast moved just out of the way of my attack, and the beam clipped the side of its metallic arm. It cried its disdain and set itself up to shoot at me. I ran behind a tree to avoid its attack.

What should I do? I could try charging and shooting at them but that seemed to be the kind of reckless thing Odd did, but it wasn't safe, and especially in this situation, there was no room for error.

I looked at my gloved hands and an idea came to me just then. I put my hands on the tree and started pulling myself up, climbing far up. I moved around the tree to get a better look at the action; Odd was head to head with the tarantula that I was supposed to be fighting, Aelita had taken one of the other tarantulas that Yumi and Ulrich had been dealing with, so everybody had their own monster to battle.

Suddenly Ulrich was devirtualized, his monster left standing victorious. I pounced into action. I launched myself from the tree and shot at the nasty Tarantula with both hands. Two beams sprouted and zoomed at the creature. Miraculously, I hit it. It exploded on the spot. I tucked in the air and managed to do summersault midair and land roughly on my feet.

I felt a laser knock me off balance and yelped in surprise. The laser nearly knocked me over the edge of the platform. I took a deep breath and pulled myself up onto solid ground again.

Odd was by my side in a flash of purple, helping me up. "Are you okay?"

"I hate when that happens," I complained. I looked around, seeing that Yumi had defeated her Tarantula and was helping Aelita fight hers off. Odd had gotten rid of the one that had just shot at me.

I took aim for the last tarantula, wanting to get this over with. I thought, Laser Bullet! And I watched as the attack didn't hit the eye of X.A.N.A., but it hit the monster. It roared as it blew up and the four of us met by the tower.

"So I don't need to hit the target to kill them?' I wondered.

Odd shook his head. "That would be nice, but no. Aelita and Yumi had hit it a few times already, so it was weak. The eye is the key to one shot demolition, everywhere else is key to a slower destruction."

"Ten seconds!" Jeremie's extremely anxious voice called as Aelita ran into the tower. Eight seconds later, her voice called over the forest sector that the tower was deactivated.

"Fantastic," Odd said, he stood beside me, holding my hand. Yumi raised an eyebrow at us but before she could question it, we were heading back in time.

The night went by again, smoothly. I kind of liked returns to the past, they gave me a chance at extra studying and training, which it seemed I did nothing but since I got to Kadic. I stayed up late to study my French, practicing and memorizing new words. I was really happy with my progress. I was already focusing on more advanced French; I was even starting to write fluently, though my spelling sucked.

The next morning I was just about to walk into the bathroom when I felt a finger jab into my back. I whirled around to see Sissi standing there, glaring at me.

"Why are you hanging out with Ulrich so much?" she snapped the question at me and I rolled my eyes.

"Because he is my friend," I replied. "Because he's a nice person, unlike you?"

"Well don't you dare think about asking him out! He's mine!" Sissi retorted.

I thought he was dating Yumi, they hadn't said they were but they sure looked like it. I didn't say that to Sissi though as I turned around to go into the bathroom.

"Hey! Don't you ignore me!" Sissi hissed. I moved out of the way before she could grab at me and shut the door on her. I went to the shower room and Sissi had enough common sense to leave me alone. I finished my shower as Aelita walked into the bathroom. She looked a little irritated, but smiled at me when she saw me anyway, always the polite friend.

"Anything bothering you?" I asked her.

"Huh? Oh, nothing. It's just…" she got her toothbrush and toothpaste from her bathroom supplies. "I wish Jeremie would try a little harder when it came to our relationship. I feel like I'm always waiting for him to do something…"

I thought about that as I washed my face and brushed my teeth. "Why don't you try something? I think he's just very shy and doesn't know what to do."

"Maybe, I wouldn't know what to do either though. Oh! I almost forgot, Yumi said she saw you and Odd holding hands on Lyoko? Did he ask you out?"

I nodded and smiled happily. "Yes, he did. Last night after my Pencak silat lesson. Isn't it wonderful?"

"Yes, but… be careful," Aelita warned. "Odd has a rough reputation with relationships. I don't want either of you to get hurt so take it slow and don't pay any attention to rumors."

I frowned. "A bad reputation?"

Aelita shook her head and started walking toward the shower room. "I don't want to give you any bad ideas. Just make sure you take things slow and you'll be fine."

So I did that. I decided not to tell Odd what Aelita had told me, since it would probably upset him. I did, however, tell him I wanted to keep things on the casual side and see where things took us.

The school day went by without any problems, except for my French class, where the teacher pointed out my terrible spelling to the entire class. Ulrich told me later that the teacher did that to everyone, he just liked to make students feel inferior to him. Math went smoothly, I even got the highest score on a surprise quiz. Everyone seemed shocked, usually Aelita, Jeremie, or Herve got the highest score on tests and quizzes. The last class of the day was P.E. where Jim made me run half a mile because I arrived to the track late because I remembered half way there that I forgot to lock up my stuff. I didn't mind though; I liked running.

So when it came time for dinner, I was thoroughly disappointed when Odd sat down next to me with terrible news.

"I can't wait for the vacation! What are you guys doing over break?" He asked everyone at the table.

"Aelita and I are going to my house and spending the break together, my dad said yes this morning," Jeremie said and Aelita kissed him on the cheek and smiled. She winked at me.

"My parents signed me up for tutoring every day except for the actual holidays," Ulrich sulked.

"I'm going to Japan for the week to visit some relatives. It's going to be great!" Yumi chimed in happily.

"What about you, Emma?" Odd asked.

"I didn't know that we had a break coming up," I said, feeling a rush of sadness. "My father is in Slovakia now and I know he can't afford to come get me so I guess I'll just stay here."

Odd blinked, "I'll ask my parents if you can come to Italy with me to be with my family. They'll say yes, they would love you!"

I shook my head. "No, I don't want to be a pest. I need to study anyway, I really stink at writing and I want to work on it to improve my spelling."

"No, that's boring. People who have lived here all their lives can't even spell, it's an obsolete skill," Odd assured me. "I want you to come to Italy with me. Please?"

I thought about it. It would be a great opportunity to travel and practice my Italian. Sure, I needed to focus more on French, but I adored the Italian language; it was the first language outside of Russian and Slovak that I started to learn when I was 11. A woman would come to visit me every week and teach me a little every time. She was sent by the church to help my father and me around our apartment.

"Please?" Odd asked again. "The thought of you studying over the holiday break is more terrifying than fighting off a hundred creepers!"

I looked at Aelita, she'd told me to take things slow with Odd and I was pretty sure this didn't count as slow. She was talking with Jeremie about something and took no notice of my confliction. "Odd, can I think about it?" I asked him.

A frown captured his lips but a smile returned within a flash. "Sure, Emma. Break starts on the day after tomorrow so if you can tell me tomorrow, I can have my mom arrange our flight."

Flight? Um…. "I've never flown… and doesn't that cost money?" I asked. I really didn't want to go if it would cost his family money and I obviously couldn't pay for it myself.

As if reading my thoughts Odd grabbed my free non-eating hand and smiled. "My family get this really big flight discount because of my dad. And we have more than enough money. Don't worry about it for a second."

Everyone else had finished eating, Odd and I were the last two to leave the cafeteria. Odd walked me to my room and left me alone with my thoughts. I Waited a minute and glanced out into the hallway to make sure he was gone before I ran over to Aelita's door and knocked. She was in her room studying with Jeremie.

"Oh," I said, embarrassed. "I'm sorry, I can come back later!"

Aelita took my arm gently. "No, you look like you need to talk and you look like you're panicking. Come in, we can take a break from studying."

Jeremie smiled at me and motioned for me to sit down anywhere. I chose Aelita's desk chair. She sat down next to Jeremie on her bed. They started playing with each other's hands, a mild show of affection.

"So what's wrong?" Aelita asked.

"Has Odd ever asked another girl to go on vacation with him?" I asked bluntly. Geez, way to look paranoid, Emma, I scolded myself mentally.

Jeremie shook his head. "He's never offered anyone to take them on Vacation. I think Ulrich has asked a million times to get away from his strict father, but Odd never seemed to want anyone to go with him. Not even when he was trying to win a girl over."

I nodded. "Why me?"

"He hates the concept of being alone, and he seems to really like you, so that means he hates the thought of you being alone," Aelita told me. "I think you should say yes. He's going to be with his family in a resort in Sanremo and I agree with him, no one should be alone on the holidays."

"Another thing… I have this fear of planes…" I added. They looked at me, questioningly. "When my father worked as a police officer in Russia, he was on duty at the time that a small plane crashed down near where he was patrolling. I heard it on the radio and didn't hear from him all day so I kept running different scenarios in my head as to ways he could have died because of it. I was still small, and nobody told me that I should calm down; nobody helped me, so that made it worse. I know now that it was silly, but the fear never really went away, nobody comforted me and reassured me that planes are actually safe so I never stopped being afraid of them."

"That's terrible," Jeremie said. "But I will assure you, nothing will go wrong on such a short flight. And Odd will be with you, I'm sure you will be perfectly safe. Each plane is checked by multiple professionals before it gets the okay to fly, to ensure maximum protection to the passengers or whatever cargo is on board."

"That does help a little," I admitted. "What if X.A.N.A. attacks while we are all gone?"

"Aelita, Ulrich, and I are still going to be in the area. The city where I live neighbors this city and Ulrich's tutor lives near Kadic so he'll be here except on the day of the Holiday." Jeremie seemed to take each little excuse I could think of not to go, and make it irrelevant.

"So, no reason why I shouldn't go?" I said, feeling almost happy.

"Go tell Odd, while you're there you can study for the chemistry test," Aelita suggested. "I am 98% sure that he and Ulrich are playing a video game or something."

I nodded and thanked the two of them. Aelita got up and hugged me goodbye and I left the room, running back to my room to get my chemistry book, I walked up to Odd and Ulrich's room. Ulrich opened the door, Odd was on his bed, listening to music.

"Wow, Aelita was wrong about the video games, but still not right about studying," I laughed. Ulrich rolled his eyes, seeming annoyed.

"I'm trying to study but he's distracting… help!" he pleaded. I walked into the room and stood in front of Odd, he was in his own world right now, staring into a space only known to him. I dropped my book on his bed, next to him and he made a squeaking sound, nearly jumping out of his skin. He looked up, glaring but his face softened into a smile when he saw me. He took his headphones off.

"Well aren't you good at scaring the fuck out of me?" he asked, he looked down at the book I'd dropped and looked back up at my smirk and groaned. "But I'm going to fail anyway!"

"Do you doubt my ability to teach you?" I asked, making a stabbing motion into my heart, feigning being stabbed in the heart. "Why not twist the knife deeper?" I joked.

He shook his head. "Fine, I bet you two euros you give up because of what a hopeless case this is."

"Ulrich, come join us, I can help you too," I offered. The brunette nodded and the three of us sat in a circle on the floor. Ulrich dived right into asking me different questions about how to do stoichiometry. Odd was less vocal so I just started by having him try some basic formulas, and telling him how he did them wrong. I even got some good out of helping them, because if I didn't know something we raced to see who could figure it out first, I usually won.

"This is great! The last test before break and I won't fail! I can finally tell my dad something good!" Ulrich cheered. "That should keep him off my back for a little while."

Odd looked pleased as well, "I owe you two euros," he said to me, digging in his pocket and handing me the coin. When I tried to give it back he ignored it.

"So did you think about whether or not you want to come to Italy with me?" he asked. I pocketed the coin he gave me and nodded. He, and even Ulrich, waited with anticipation.

"I'll go, but only if -," I couldn't complete my sentence because I found myself tackled and kissed before I could get the words out. Odd was on top of me, laughing and kissing me out of joy. He looked down at me as if to let me finish my thought. "Only if you ask your mom right now and put her on speaker so I can hear if she really doesn't mind. If I hear uncertainty, especially about money, I'm not going to go."

Odd nodded, not seeming worried at all. He made a grab for his phone, not getting off of me, and dialed his mom's number. When the phone started to ring, he put it on speaker. Ulrich had gone back to studying on his own and seemed to be tuning us out.

"Hello, Odd, dear! How are you doing?" her voice sang through the small speaker.

"Hey, mom! I'm doing really well. My girlfriend just helped me study for a test and I'm not going to fail it!" Odd said happily. "I have a question for you, it's about our trip to Sanremo?"

"Yes, what is it, sweetheart?" she asked. "And that's great about your test! Your friend sounds like she's smart, like your other friends!"

"Oh, she is. She's at Kadic on a scholarship," Odd said, smiling at me. He was doing this on purpose, making his mom love me before he asked. I glared at him, he stuck his tongue out in response. He was so close to me that it was just inches from my face. I rolled my eyes. "Anyway, would it be okay if she came with us?"

"Hasn't she got her own family to visit over the Holiday?" she asked. I couldn't tell if she was for or against it yet.

"She does have family but she can't visit them, they can't afford to bring her home," Odd said, looking uncomfortable. It seemed he liked talking me up by telling her how smart I was, but he didn't like talking about my misfortune, even if it probably helped him out.

"Oh, well if she really wants to join us, I'd love to meet her. She can room with Louise. You're still going to room in a suite with your father and I?"

"Yeah, mom," Odd said, he kissed me then, quietly. "Listen, I'll see you in a few days. Tell everyone hi for me!" He hung up and smiled at me. "Told you my mom was awesome."

I smiled at him, "this is going to be so exciting!" I exclaimed giddily. I pulled his head down and kissed him. He kissed back and Ulrich made a gagging noise as he left the room to give us privacy.


	7. Shopping Trip

**A/N: So I have just discovered that there is some formatting problems within some of the upcoming chapters and I want to fix them before I try posting them so there might be a delay... Sorry about that!**

* * *

The next day I felt that I could barely contain my enthusiasm. All of my teachers seemed to notice and praised me for getting along so well in Kadic. In chemistry class, Mrs. Hertz proudly announced that Ulrich and Odd didn't have the lowest grades for once, they'd both gotten solid B- grades. They gave all the credit to me and the class had a laughing fit at my reddened face. When classes were over, Aelita and Yumi were in my room, hanging out and helping me pack for Italy.

"So, this… is all you have?" Yumi asked, looking at the small pile of clothes. "Emma, this won't be enough for the week, especially for nicer dinners..." She shook her head and gave Aelita a look.

"Emma, do you want to go thrift shopping now? We can get some more clothes for your trip," Aelita said. "There is a really nice, inexpensive store nearby the school and we can make it a girls' night before we all leave."

"My parents want me to get some new clothes for myself, too. They gave me an allowance," Yumi added.

I went over to my desk and grabbed the jar of money I had. I counted twenty euros, 22 euros, if I added Odd's two that he gave me the night before. I dumped the money out into my hand and pocketed it. I turned to see Yumi and Aelita already ready to go.

I followed Yumi and Aelita off of the Kadic campus and we walked through the city and finally stopped in front of a small shop. I saw lots of clothes inside, and a sign in the window that bragged of low prices. We walked inside and the girls went to work sifting through the clothes. I looked as well but couldn't decide what I would like to wear. I walked over to the shoes and found a pair that I liked, a simple pair of sneakers; mine were falling apart, so I figured a pair of shoes would be the smartest way to go. They were fifteen euros; of course I probably wouldn't be able to buy any actual clothes.

I was waiting for the woman to bring my size out from the back of the store, when Yumi tapped me on the shoulder. "try this on!" she ordered, holding up an emerald green dress. I took it and tried to look for the price. Yumi smacked my hand away from the tag. "Never look at the price tag before you try something on, it ruins how the dress looks."

I rolled my eyes but smiled. Why not? I never try things on for fun. I walked into the changing room and tried the dress on. I stared at my reflection in the mirror and couldn't believe how I looked.

The dress had a scoop neck and came to just around my knees. Around the waist was a black ribbon belt that tied into a bow in the back. I spun around, feeling truly feminine for the first time.

"Get out here and show us!" Yumi ordered, followed by a giggle from Aelita. I opened the door and the girls stared, shocked expressions on their faces.

"It's so stunning!" Aelita breathed. "Emma, you're so pretty!"

"Yeah, you're pretty anyway, but this dress just makes your eyes pop, and shows off your tiny little waist," Yumi explained. "It really does suit you."

I smiled and looked into the mirror on the door. "It's very pretty… but I can tell I won't be able to afford it. I'm already getting a new pair of shoes."

"It's nice to try things on though so you know what kind of clothes you should look for," Yumi said to me. "Take it off and I'll go put it back. Maybe you'll be able to buy it another time."

I went back into the changing room and took the dress off. I tossed it over the top of the door and Yumi grabbed it on the other side. I put my clothes back on and left the changing room.

I left the store with the new shoes and a new shirt that only cost five euros. Yumi had a bag of clothes and so did Aelita. Yumi bought me some toiletries from a convenience store on the way back to Kadic, she told me that it was always a good idea to pack bathroom essentials because hotels didn't provide a lot.

**-Yumi's point of view-**

When the girls came back to Emma's room, Emma and Aelita went upstairs real quick to ask Odd more about their trip. Yumi stayed in Emma's room to start packing Emma's clothes into her duffel bag. She went to her bag of clothes and pulled the green dress that Emma had tried on and stuffed it into the bag carefully. Yumi grinned slyly, she scribbled a note, "Here's a present from me to you!" and signed it. She put the note inside of the dress and buried more clothes on top of it.

Aelita and Emma returned a minute later with a few more pieces of clothing. "Aelita's letting me borrow some of her clothes to ensure I have enough… Odd says we're going to be doing a lot of different things. He mentioned swimming so she gave me one of her swim suits…"

Yumi motioned toward the duffel bag, "well there is a lot more room in here. But you should be all set. I should head for home, my parents are going to be wondering where I am soon." She told them. She gave both of them a hug goodbye.

"I put it in her bag, we're all set," Yumi whispered when she hugged Aelita.

"Great!" Aelita replied. "Have a safe trip, Yumi," she said in her normal volume.

**-Emma's Point of View-**

I finished packing after both Aelita and Yumi left and I sat down to write a letter to my dad. I walked down to the main floor of the dormitory building where students were hugging goodbye and leaving with parents, suitcases in hand. Sissi was talking with her two lackeys and she watched me with suspicion as I dropped my letter in the mail box, and left the floor. I ignored her completely.

Odd and I were going to meet outside the front gates at five in the morning; the taxi was due to pick us up at 5:15. The plane would take us to another part of France, where we would board a bus that would take us directly to the resort.

I checked my bags once more, making sure I had everything. When I was satisfied, I decided to get to sleep, so I'd be well rested for the trip tomorrow.


	8. Meeting the Della Robbia Family

I woke up at 4:30 in the morning and took a quick shower and got dressed, Odd told me to dress comfortably so I chose a purple short sleeve shirt with a long sleeve white shirt underneath, paired with a a black jean skirt that Aelita lent me. I felt really lucky that Aelita and I wore the same sized clothes. I slipped on my old shoes and brushed my hair back, pulling it into a ponytail.

I left my room at 4:50 A.M., I set my things down in front of the front gate and sat down next to it. Odd arrived shortly after. He was carrying Kiwi in his arms.

"So I have a proposition," he said to me after a good morning kiss. "Pets are supposed to travel with the luggage, but I hate leaving him alone…" he started.

"So we need to take him with us to our seats," I finished.

"Yeah. The thing is, is that the security runs carry-on luggage through a scan and they would see him if I just held him in my backpack," Odd said to me. "So I have a plan!"

When the taxi arrived the driver loaded our bags into the trunk of the car. Odd explained the plan to me and I scowled. Of course it involved being deceitful, and I wasn't comfortable about that.

"Come on, just think of Kiwi, all alone in a crate," Odd said holding Kiwi up to my face. Kiwi licked my nose and whimpered.

"I suppose so… will we get into a awful lot of trouble if they catch us?"

"Don't know, I've never been caught," Odd told me.

When we got to the airport, Odd collected our tickets from the main desk. I followed him through the giant building. We got rid of our luggage, all but our backpacks, and headed toward the security scan.

"Are you ready?" he asked me. I nodded and dropped my backpack on the conveyer belt and stepped through the metal detector, luckily there was no metal on my skirt. I got a quick pat down and grabbed my bag. When it came time for Odd to do his, he set it down and immediately engaged the guard in conversation, drawing his eyes away from the screen. When Odd's backpack came through on the other end, I unzipped it quickly and Kiwi jumped into mine. I zipped it back up just as the guard looked back at the screen.

"Oh! Oops, I didn't watch… Do you mind if I send your bag back through?" he asked Odd. I picked it up and handed it to the man and he sent the Kiwi-less backpack through one more time. Odd walked through the metal detector to stand by me, taking my hand.

"Everything is in order, you two are all set to go. Enjoy your trip!" the guard said cheerfully as he checked our tickets off and handed them to us.

"That was fantastic," Odd cheered when we were out of earshot. "Hey, do you want breakfast? Our plane doesn't leave for another half hour."

I nodded, I felt my stomach rumble and he grinned. He led me to a small food court where we found a man who was making breakfast crepes. I told Odd what I'd like and went to find a spot for the two of us to sit.

He came over with a tray a few minutes later, complete with four small crepes, two cups of coffee, and a yogurt for me. We ate as Odd told me all about Italy and how much I would love it.

I felt nervous about this trip, though. My life had done a complete 180 degree turn, from peasant to what felt like royalty. I thought of my family in Slovakia and in Russia and felt guilty; here I was about to go to a nice resort in Italy, and they were barely scraping by at home.

Odd took my free hand then, snapping me out of my stupor. "Something bothering you?"

"It's all so unbelievable," I told him. He looked puzzled.

"It's just an airport," he said, chuckling.

"No, not the airport, though it is pretty impressive… I mean my life since I came to Kadic," I explained. "Meeting you completely changed everything."

"For good or for bad?" he asked. "Change can go either way…"

I thought about that. "Mostly for good," I decided. "The only real stress I have now is helping you all with X.A.N.A. and Lyoko."

Odd nodded. "It can be pretty stressful sometimes, but I try to make sure I have fun, I like to think I work best when I'm having fun and running on instinct."

"Yeah I can see that about you. You have a different style; Ulrich and Yumi are more serious when on Lyoko." I thought about it for a moment, "Yumi takes everything seriously, Ulrich is more focused, and you take everything in stride."

"I trust my instinct, they don't. Sure sometimes it get me devirtualized quickly or I get into some other trouble, but usually my instinct leads me into victory! If I did things like Yumi and Ulrich, I don't think I'd be as amazing as I am," Odd confided with an easy confidence. "Anyway, we should get to the gate. Are you almost done?"

I took the last bite of my yogurt and set the container on the tray. "All done, let's go!"

When they started to let passengers on the plane Odd and I were the first ones on. We had seats close to the front of the plane. We had individual TVs where we could listen to music, watch TV, or watch movies out of the selection that the plane had. First we had to watch a required safety video and wait for the flight attendants to check all of the overhead storage compartments, and then Odd and I picked a movie to watch together; we chose terminator.

"That hit a little too close to home for comfort," I muttered when it ended. It was pretty scary; robots and computers trying to take over the world. "It's like X.A.N.A. : meant to help human kind, but instead trying to wipe us out?"

Odd shrugged. "The only difference is that was a movie, X.A.N.A. is real life."

When the plane landed we got our luggage and walked out of the airport, the bus that would take us to Sanremo was due to arrive at 8:30, so we had to wait twenty minutes. Odd bought us some snacks from a vending machine and we ate in silence. Odd fed Kiwi and let the dog do his business in a nearby patch of grass until the bus arrived.

I spent most of the bus ride glued to the window in awe; we travelled along the mountainside and I couldn't believe what I saw. It felt as though I was on top of the world. Odd found it amusing and spent most of the ride watching my reaction to the French/Italian countryside.

"I wish I had a camera," I said to him finally.

"You like taking pictures? You never told me that," Odd responded. He dug in his backpack and pulled one out, it was a small digital camera. I felt joy rise as I took the camera and turned it on. I played with the settings for a minute before I went to work.

"You should join the cinema club, we do a lot with photography and I think you'd love film, too," Odd said as he watched me take pictures of the Mediterranean.

"When we go back to Kadic I'll go check it out," I promised him. "It does sound like fun."

"And Emma? Welcome to Italy. Get ready to have an amazing week!" He said happily.

When we got to the resort, Odd called one of his sisters. She said they'd all checked in already, and said they should just come up to their rooms. "We'll go to your room first, I'll introduce you to Louise," Odd told me when we got into the elevator.

"Does she mind sharing a room with me since she hasn't met me?" I asked him anxiously. I've never slept in the same room with someone I didn't know. Sleeping left people vulnerable, and I hated being vulnerable in front of strangers.

"She's the nicest one of my sisters. She's the oldest so I think she's just more mature thn Pauline, Marie, Elisabeth, and Adèle."

"They are all older than you?" I asked, I still couldn't believe it.

"Well, Elisabeth, Pauline, and Adèle are triplets… and for some reason my parents decided it was a good idea to keep going after that, I guess." The elevator doors opened then and we walked into the hallway. The hotel had a rich mahogany wood floor with an ornate royal blue rug that stretched down the whole hallway. Across from the elevator where vending machines and an ice machine. "You're in room 5-24."

I found my door and unlocked it, when I opened it I heard the voices quiet. Odd and I walked in and Odd was grabbed around the neck.

"Odd! How's it going, bro?" asked the girl who had him in a bear hug. She had the same eyes as he did, and surprisingly the same purple in her hair except it was a longer streak off to the side of her head. She wore her hair down, and it was long and wavy. She had a very pretty smile.

The other girl just hung back and offered a friendly smile. She was also very pretty. She wore her hair in a long side braid. Her hair was a darker blond and didn't have any purple in it. She wore glasses.

When Odd's captor released him he made a show of gasping for breath and she rolled her eyes and turned her attention to me. She gave me a hug, not as big as Odd's hug but it was friendly. "Hi! I'm Louise, your roommate, she's Marie," the girl said upon releasing me. "Which language are you more comfortable with, Italian or French?"

I glanced at Odd, how much had he told them about me? I shrugged at Louise. "I'm fine with either one, I am more fluent in Italian but I'm trying to improve on my French."

Louise nodded her understanding. "Excellent. So I guess just unpack on your own time. We are going to go to dinner later on; do you have any dresses packed? If you don't I think I have something that will fit you…"

"No, I don't have anything formal," I blushed, embarrassed. I hadn't thought of that… "Nobody told me…"

Louise nodded, knowingly. "I have something for you."

"You should look in your duffel bag, Yumi said you had something formal," Odd told me. I raised an eyebrow, confused. Before I could interrogate him, three girls ran into the room and tackled Odd to the ground. All three girls looked the same except for their hair and their clothes.

One of the girls had her hair cut short and spiky, with a purple streak exactly like Odd's. She wore a red t shirt with the Flash's symbol on it and a pair of bell bottom blue jeans. The next girl had her hair long and curled, and she wore a green sweater and black skinny jeans. The last of the girls wore her hair pin straight, but it was light brown with no streak, and she wore a dark blue, knee length sweater dress.

"Get up guys, come on!" Odd pleaded. Marie and Louise snickered on the sidelines as they watched their three sisters dominate their little brother. Finally they seemed to take notice of the new girl standing by the door and looked up at me, Odd pushed them off and stood beside me, crossing his arms and glaring at the three of them.

"Emma, these are the triplets," Odd started. He pointed to the one in the Flash shirt, "Adèle," she smiled and waved. "Pauline," he said, motioning to the girl in green. "And obviously, last but not least, the one denying her natural features is Elisabeth." He said.

"Odd, I got tired of people pestering me, telling me it was unnatural and dumb looking," Elisabeth defended.

"It did get annoying, didn't it?" Marie chimed in. They were the only two who'd dyed the purple out of their hair.

"Well, if you know how to work it, work it!" Pauline giggled.

"So, Emma, Odd says you're a brainiac?" Adèle jumped to her feet. She looked the most like Odd out of all of them because of her short hair and vibrant energy.

"Oh, um…" I was starting to feel a little overwhelmed. This always happened when I met new people. My heart started racing. "I do alright. I'm not as smart as some other people I know."

"And you're from Russia?" Pauline asked me. I nodded and she continued. "Isn't it freezing cold there? Bet you love it here in the south of Europe."

"It's wonderful," I admitted. "And No, Russia isn't always freezing, only usually." Everyone found that funny, they started laughing and I chuckled.

Everything calmed down and Odd went to his suite to unpack and get ready for dinner, along with Marie, Adèle, Pauline, and Elisabeth. I remembered that he'd told me to check my duffel bag and I did just that, finding the bag with the dress inside of it. The price tag had been cut off. I grimaced, knowing she would only do that if it was expensive.

"Oh my gosh!" Louise cooed, "it is so pretty! You're definitely wearing that tonight!"

"I don't have shoes for it," I told her sadly. I did really want to wear it. I figured that if Yumi wanted me to have it, I minus well wear it.

"What's your size?" she asked. When I told her she handed me a pair of sparkly black flats. "It's half a size off, but they should work. Let me see how it all looks!"

I went into the bathroom and washed up, then slipped on the dress. I walked out of the bathroom and Louise had also changed. She wore a sleek purple maxi dress with silver 2- inch heels.

"Gorgeous, now we just need to do your hair. Do you have any makeup?" she asked. She pointed to the vanity and I sat down, shaking no to her question. "Okay, we'll keep it simple; I've got some makeup you can use."

So that was that, Louise straightened my hair so it wasn't a frizzy, wavy mess and put some product in it to make it stay straight and frizz free. She put some makeup on me and I think the eyeliner was the scariest part… seriously how did girls not poke their eyes out? She did her own hair and makeup and by the time we were done, it was time to go to the restaurant. Louise led the way out of the hotel and we left the resort to a nearby restaurant. On the way Louise talked animatedly about the game plan.

"Odd is going down with our parents, and the terrible threesome and Marie are coming together. We have this all planned out; You're not a Della Robbia unless you make an entrance!" I laughed at that, Odd definitely lived by that rule. We left the room and I mentally prepared myself for dinner.


	9. Dinner With the Family

Odd and his parents were already downstairs, and upon seeing me, his mom jumped up and kissed me on both cheeks, along with Odd's father. They looked me up and down and gave me a grand smile of approval. Odd stood as well, looking stunned. He gave me a kiss and smiled at me. "You look magnificent," he said after his lips released mine.

"Thank Yumi for this dress," I told him. "She acted on her own, I'm sure Aelita was in on it but I was completely unaware."

He smirked. "Don't worry about it. She always has extra money with her because her parents keep hoping she'll drop the all black look. She did that for Aelita before we were able to set Aelita up with her own bank account."

We all sat down, Odd's mom insisted I sit between her and Odd, so that's what we did. Of course we had to wait for the other four to show up before we could order. I tried to look at my menu to find the cheapest meal, but Odd informed me that his dad was the only person at the table with the prices. He told me not to worry about it.

The four girls arrived then, I barely recognized them when they weren't buzzing with energy. Adèle wore a bright red strapless mini dress and her hair was styled in a slightly different, spiky manner. Pauline had an orange dress that looked the same as Adèle's except she paired it with a sparkly green belt and sparkly green flats. And Elisabeth had a maxi dress like Louise's dress, in blue with a studded halter neckline. Marie had a dark red dress with grey stripes accenting the structure, paired with a matte red high heel.

The dinner was very nice, Odd's dad told them the schedule for the following day and Odd's mom told them of her artistic exploits since the last time they'd all been together. I discovered that the triplets all attended a school in Italy, on a scholarship. It was al all girls school. Marie and Louise were both of university age and went to a University in Paris, Marie studied law and Louise studied fashion design.

"So, Emma, what are your hobbies?" Odd's dad asked me suddenly.

I thought about that for a moment, "well I like photography and Odd says he wants to see if I'll like film when we go back to school," I responded honestly. "Back in Russia I spent a lot of my time cooking and cleaning and helping my aunt take care of my mother."

"So you want to be a photographer?" Odd's mom asked, seeming interested.

"I would like to take more photos but I don't have a camera. When I took pictures with my family I always used a disposable camera," I told her.

"You can use mine whenever you want," Odd said. "And once you join the cinema club, you can rent their equiptment."

After dinner Odd took my hand and we went to explore Sanremo. "I have some things to show you," he'd said, pulling me out of my seat. I waved a quick goodbye to Odd's wonderful family as we left. He led me through the hilly streets of Sanremo and I felt totally awe-struck at the beauty of the small city. After a while though, I realized that my feet were killing me and I remembered that it was pretty chilly.

"Are we almost there?" I asked him. He nodded.

Finally we stopped walking and I felt my breath stop, we were situated on a hill, looking out over what felt like the entire world. I could see miles and miles of Italy stretched out in front of me. I could see the Mediterranean Sea when I turned around. I was entirely speechless.

"So was this worth all the walking?" Odd asked after a minute. He pulled me over to a bench nearby and we sat together. "This would be even better if it was Summer…"

As if on cue my body shuddered and I hugged myself; Louise had lent me a shrug but that wasn't much help. My eyes were glued to the vista view in front of me, I never wanted to leave this spot.

Unfortunately, we did have to leave because it was getting colder by the minute it seemed, plus it was getting dark; Odd made me wear his jacket as we walked back to the hotel. "Don't worry, we'll go back there before we leave and hopefully it will be warmer," Odd assured me when I mentioned how much I loved it.

When we got to the hotel, Odd took me to his room where we played with Kiwi for a little while; Pauline, Marie, and Adèle were all hanging out there as well, watching a movie with their dad. After the movie ended the girls went back to their room and I followed suit. Considering the schedule for the next day would be jammed packed with fun, sleep would be the best thing.

"I really hope you enjoy yourself this week," Odd told me in the hallway. "I want this to be a perfect week."

"It will be perfect. So I'll see you at 9 for breakfast?" I asked just outside of my room.

"Yeah, don't worry, no more formal clothes for the rest of the week," he assured me.

"Thank god," I laughed.

"Though I meant what I said earlier, you look magnificent, you always do!" he said enthusiastically and kissed me goodnight. I blushed a deep red as he walked back to his room, and I fumbled with the key as I opened the door. Louise was already in her night clothes, sitting on her bed with a pencil and a pad of paper.

"What are you up to?" I asked her, shutting the door behind me.

"I'm working on a design for my class," she responded.

"Sounds cool," I told her. I grabbed the shampoo, conditioner, and body soap that Yumi had bought for me, along with my night clothes. "I'm taking a shower." And I did, I replayed the wonderful night and slept easily.


	10. Time in Italy

The next few days in Italy were out of this world; Odd's family took me everywhere, we even got on a bus and went to Eze, Cannes, and Monaco in one day, and we visited Nice for another day. I learned so much about France and Italy that I knew I wouldn't be able to remember it all. During the whole expedition I took thousands of photos. I spent a lot of time looked at them and getting rid of the duds. The girls took me shopping on the last day, Odd's mother included. She insisted that I buy anything I liked, and hesitantly, I did so. Odd spent that time with his dad.

That night, while the rest of the family went to dinner, Odd and I stayed in my room to watch a movie. We chose He Loves Me... He Loves Me Not, a psychological thriller about a girl who is obsessed with a married cardiologist. We spent the whole movie eating food that we'd picked up from the supermarket. We also made out a lot. A lot.

"So did you enjoy yourself this week?" Odd asked me when we took breathing breaks.

"I did, it was the best week of my life," I told him. "It's a shame we can't stay here forever."

"We need to go home to X.A.N.A. , I'm surprised he left us alone all week, I even called Jeremie to make sure everyone was still alive," Odd said, grinning. I laughed. We went back to kissing.

A lot.

"It bums me out that we never got to go back to that hill we went to on our first night," I said when we took another break.

"We're going to go tomorrow morning," Odd assured me. "Sunrise! It'll be great. This time we'll have my camera too."

"Oh I love it when you talk," I said and pushed him down on my bed and rolled on top of him. I did love him, I know that I'm young, but I know what I feel. Even if it doesn't last forever, it's lasting now and I plan on making the most of it.

"Can I try something?" Odd asked me suddenly. I nodded, not caring as long as we were kissing while he did it. I felt his hand crawl under my shirt and cup around my breast. I felt my body freeze and I pulled away. His hand whipped out and he pulled up from under me and blushed.

I stared at him, face red as a tomato, and I couldn't think of anything to say.

"I'm sorry, I tried to ask you but you were distracted…"

"No, no it was fine," I assured. "I just wasn't expecting it." And it totally ruined it, I added mentally.

"So…" Odd sounded how I felt.

"I think we should just keep going the way we're going," I said softly. "I love you but I'm not ready to take it further than we've gone, especially since we've only been going out less than a month."

Odd nodded. "I understand, I think it was just…"

"That's my fault, things were getting so heated right there… I'm sorry."

"Let's just pretend it didn't happen," he suggested. "I think we should call it a night though. I'll come pick you up at 5:30, try packing tonight so that when we get back, we'll be able to just leave. We'll ride the bus to the airport, the plane leaves at 1:15 P.M.," Odd told me, getting up and leaving my room. I stared as he left and groaned, throwing my face into my pillow. A perfectly awkward ending to the perfect week.

I took a shower and packed my bags up, finding it difficult to fit all of the new things I had into my backpack and duffel bag. When I was done I crawled into bed hoping to fall asleep easily. Instead of sleeping I dwelled on the scene between Odd and I from earlier.

Louise came in sometime around 11 P.M., and I pretended to be asleep and she didn't bother me. She took a shower and went to bed quietly, and within minutes I heard her snoring. I wish I could do that….

Eventually I fell asleep, only to be woken by an alarm clock at five. I rolled out of bed and clumsily put on fresh clothes for the day and stuffed my night clothes in the duffel bag. I went to the vending machine on the floor and found Odd was already there drinking an espresso. When he looked up at me he blushed; it was obvious he'd thought about the disastrous night all night instead of sleeping as well. I bought an espresso and we drank in silence.

"Rough night?" I asked him.

He nodded. "I'm so sorry I did that," he said looking at me, he looked like he was about to cry. "It was so stupid of me, I have no idea what I was thinking…"

"Oh, Odd! I know what happened. It was as much my fault as it was yours," I assured him. "We just need to remember to keep our heads straight when we're together. Are you ready to go?"

We finished our coffee and found we were both buzzing with the caffeine driven energy. We reached the hill before the sun rose and sat down on the bench. I turned his camera on and went to work, taking candid shots. I took some pictures with Odd in them and he did the same with me. There was no kissing, like there normally was when we interacted, and he kept his hands to himself. I hated that but I knew it was for the best right now until we got over the awkward event of last night.

"Shall we go? My mom told me last night that she wants to go out to breakfast with just the two of us before we go back to Kadic," Odd informed me, "at a café nearby here."

So we went, the café was a small one; it was literally one hundred feet from where we were sitting. Odd's mom was sitting outside at a table waiting for us. We sat down and a waiter handed us all menus. We all ordered coffee to drink.

"Odd, Emma, I want to talk to you about something," Odd's mom began when we got our coffee. She took a sip and looked at the both of us, her eyes more serious than I'd seen then all week. I glanced at Odd and he shrugged, also seeming confused.

"I've been observing your relationship over the week and I wsnt to tell you what I've seen," she started, sending me into a deeper confusion and fear. "I've seen adoration and to be honest, some lust. I want to tell you to be careful," she started. I bit the inside of my cheek, thinking of the night before. Odd started inspecting his shoes.

"I've also seen a protective aspect, especially on Odd's end. This tells me that you two have danced with danger, and I want to tell you not to be too reckless with whatever you're doing. I am a firm believer in adventure, but sometimes adventure can bite you in the ass if you're too careless." Our menus arrived then and we ordered. "May I ask what adventures you two have had together?"

"We save the world on a daily basis," Odd said and smiled. She thought that was funny and took our hands.

"As long as you're safe," she replied, finding his answer satisfactory. "Odd, you protect this girl," she told him suddenly, squeezing my hand. "She's a special girl."

"I know, Ma," he said, taking my hand with his free hand. We were all sitting around the table holding hands now. "She's very special." He added.

I blushed furiously and Odd laughed, his mom smiled released our hands. Odd kissed my cheek and looked into my eyes, his amber eyes serious, "I'll always be there to protect you."

Our food came then and we dug in, Odd's mom ate almost as much as he did. I concluded that the fast metabolism was a Della Robbia family trait. After breakfast we walked arm in arm in arm back to the hotel. I brought my stuff into their room and helped Odd to pack all of his stuff.


	11. Back to Kadic

The trip back to Kadic was a reverse of the trip to Sanremo. Bus to plane to taxi to Kadic. This doesn't mean the scenery was less breathtaking, it just means I had a final chance to enjoy it all before we went back to the real world of Kadic, which was still pretty amazing for me.

It was Saturday night at Kadic and Odd and I were amongst the very few students who were back from their trips. Jeremie and Aelita would arrive tomorrow morning, Ulrich would return tomorrow night, and we would see Yumi as usual when classes resumed. Odd and I spent the evening in the recreation room playing ping pong. It was completely uneventful.

That is, until Sissi walked into the room, her eyes glued to me. I narrowed my eyes, daring her to bother us. She took the dare and smirked, standing right in front of the table, grabbing the ball midair.

"So, I hear you two went on Holiday together?" she asked. "Isn't that sweet!"

"What do you want, Sissi?" Odd asked, irritation dripping.

"Oh, nothing. I'm just surprised, Odd. Usually your flings are short lived. I suppose congratulations are in order for your games lasting more than two days," she said. "You had to outgrow your womanizing tactics eventually. I just didn't expect it to be this soon!"

I felt anger rise in my chest. "Sissi, you can give us our ball back, now," I hissed. "You can go dig a ditch, as well," I added.

"Yeah, Sissi go fuck yourself," Odd added. "I've never been a womanizer."

"Dating Claire and Magali at once? Oh right, that just makes you a manwhore," Sissi sneered. Before I knew it, my arm flew into her face. She squawked in surprise and fell backward, blood dripping from her nose. Odd's jaw dropped and I shook my fist out, cringing. I looked at Sissi and then at Odd and my eyes widened, realizing what I'd just done.

"Sissi, I…" I started but she ran out of the rec room holding her face and sniffling.

"Oh, fuck!" I cursed. "I'm in trouble, aren't I? Oh shit, I didn't mean to, it just happened!" I exclaimed. He nodded slowly and walked around the table and hugged me, holding me up before I completely lost it. I felt my heart thumping out of control and the room suddenly became very hot and I felt like I would pass out.

So I did.

I woke up in the infirmary; Principal Delmas, Odd, and the nurse were all staring down at me. Odd was holding my hand. I felt a migraine pounding in my temple and cringed as I tried to sit up. Odd pushed me back down and shook his head, worry in his eyes.

"Don't try getting up. You need to rest," the nurse said to me. "Do you remember what happened?"

I thought back and remembered everything. "Sissi was antagonizing us and I couldn't control it, she made me so mad I hit her… and then I realized what I'd done and had a sort of panic attack, I guess."

She's always kind of high strung," Odd told the nurse. "She always seems anxious in some way…" She nodded, knowingly.

"You have a history of being anxious?" the nurse asked me. I nodded and scowled. I had always tried to hide it; guess I'm not very good at keeping it to myself.

"I suggest you come see me once a week to learn how to manage your anxiety," she said after a minute. She took my vitals then and told me that I should just spend the night in the infirmary so she could observe me, but tomorrow I should be fine to leave.

"I'm afraid that because of the circumstances and our protocols against violence…" principal Delmas started abruptly. "I'm going to have to assign you four hours of detention with our P.E. teacher. You can serve the detention any time this week. I will talk to Elizabeth and punish her for her role in this. Odd told me also that she was antagonizing the two of you unprovoked so I'll go talk to her. She's in the next room."

I nodded. "Thank you, sir. I will serve the detention on Monday," I promised.

When the principal left Odd sat down on the edge of my bed and looked down at me, still holding my hand. "You scared the shit out of me," he said quietly. The nurse was on the other side of the room filling out papers.

"I'm so sorry," I replied. "She just really upset me…"

"You don't need to defend me," he told me. "I do have a reputation around here and nothing will change that. Maybe if I show everyone how devoted I am to you they'll change their minds about be eventually, but for now just ignore them."

I nodded slowly, that's exactly what Aelita had told me in the beginning. "So I need to sleep here," I said, looking around. "What time is it?" I asked.

"Ten. I'm going to stay with you for as long as you'll have me, and hopefully Yolanda won't kick me out…" Odd glanced over to the nurse as if checking to see if she looked like she would do just that; she looked indifferent.

The night went by slowly. Odd tried to help me fall asleep, stroking my hair and humming softly. Finally at 11:30 I fell asleep, into a deep state of vivid dreaming.

I dreamt I was in the cinema studio, cleaning up the equipment I'd been using when a man I didn't recognize entered the room; We were the only two there in the room. I didn't think he was a teacher or one of the support staff, he looked too… scary to be. I looked into his eyes and saw X.A.N.A. . I grimaced, knowing what I had to do now.

I ran. I ran out of the studio and into another part of the building, trying to find Odd or Aelita, someone I could tell. Nobody else seemed to be in the building, not even the building director. I came to a dark room and tried locking myself in, but the man was too fast. Before I knew it he had me trapped in the dark.

I felt him grab me roughly and throw me into the closed and locked door. The light was on, signaling that no one should disturb the room. I tried to scream but nothing would come out. I tried to get up but he had a foot on my chest, holding me down in the floor. I thought frantically of a way to contact the group, I had none.

Suddenly the man had tape, the industrial kind that was nearly impossible to break. He taped my arms together above my head, to the door so I was sitting up. I tried to kick him but he grabbed my foot and chopped down on it with brutal strength. I heard a cracking sound and finally I did scream, blood curdling cries that I hoped reached the ears of someone in the vicinity. He taped my feet apart from each other, my legs were spread.

I felt a cold sweat drip down my face as he tore off my clothes. His X.A.N.A. eyes sparkled with amusement as he touched my bareskin, sending electric sparks through my body. I cried and pleaded for him to stop when I felt someone was pounding at the door behind me.

"I win," the X.A.N.A.-fied man sneered at me, pulling his pants down he did the unspeakable.

* * *

**A/N: so I tried to keep that somewhat tame despite what's occuring... I hope it wasn't lame or a flat out horrible chapter... let me know what you thought of it.**


	12. Nightmares and Reunion

And I woke up, shooting up and feeling a terrible pain in my neck. I looked down at myself and saw I was still fully clothed in the nightgown that Yolanda had me put on for the night. She was in the next room; I knew she was sleeping soundly, not a bad dream in sight.

I steadied my breathing and looked at the time; 3:18 A.M… I laid back down and stared at the dark ceiling until Yolanda woke up at 6. I rolled onto my side, facing the wall and closing my eyes. I couldn't believe that I would have a dream like that, I didn't understand why I would have a dream like that. I felt like it was completely random and ridiculous. It was the most terrifying dream… especially at the end.

What does dream rape mean? My subconscious had to have been trying to tell me something. But what? Don't work in the cinema club alone? Don't join at all? Get a cell phone so something like that doesn't happen? It could be anything or all of those things.

I heard Yolanda open her door and I rolled back onto my back and opened my eyes.

"Oh, did I wake you?" she asked me, seeing that I was up.

"No, I woke up a few minutes ago," I told her. "I'm an early riser by nature."

She nodded and chuckled. "So am I, you get a lot done if you wake up early. Can I check your vitals now or would you like me to wait?"

I let her do it and then she went to get me some breakfast. She gave me a juice cup, a banana, and a croissant. After I ate she told me that I could go back to my room. We made an appointment for my anxiety management before I left.

I walked to the dormitory building and managed to reach my room without anyone seeing me. I changed out of the night gown and set it to the side; Yolanda wanted me to bring it back to her later in the day. I put my robe on and walked to the bathroom with my usual things and took a shower, brushing my teeth and hair after as I normally did. I changed into my clothes for the day and left the bathroom. On my way out I spotted Aelita going into her room. She didn't see me.

I ran to her room and hugged her from behind, she spun around and hugged me back and we both immediately done into our holiday stories. She and Jeremie had spent a lot of time on his laptop working on programs and keeping an eye out for X.A.N.A. , but they'd also spent a lot of time experimenting and forming a stronger connection as a couple. I told her that Odd and I had done a lot of really amazing things in Italy. I left out the boob situation, and I also left out what happened with Sissi when we got back.

"Oh my god, I need to show you the pictures we took! Odd has the camera," I told her. When she finished unpacking her stuff, she and I ran upstairs to find that Odd was in Jeremie's room, already showing off pictures on Jeremie's computer.

"Hey!" I scolded. "We were going to show them together!" Aelita sat on Jeremie's lap and Jeremie went back to the first photo and they watched the slideshow while Odd and I watched them watch. Jeremie thought the pictures looked nice; Aelita was more detailed with her praise and went as far as to declare the photo of Odd and I dancing on the harbor to be her favorite.

"So how do you feel?" Odd asked me suddenly.

"Fine, Yolanda let me leave pretty early," I told him, blushing. I hadn't wanted Jeremie and Aelita to know about it…

"What happened?" Jeremie asked, sounding concerned.

"You spent the night in the infirmary?" Aelita asked.

"I passed out last night from a panic attack," I mumbled.

"She punched Sissi in the face," Odd said, not sounding proud, per se… but he definitely didn't sound like he was ashamed.

"Why?" Aelita asked.

"She was probably asking for it," Jeremie said. They both waited for me to explain.

So I did. "And I felt so bad… I knew I was about to get in a lot of trouble…" I said when I finished.

"Principal Delmas let you off easy though," Odd assured. "Because he could see how badly you felt about it."

"Wild," Aelita breathed. "From what it sounds like, she did kind of deserve it. She was trying to make you mad."

I shrugged. "I don't condone violence though, I have no idea what came over me…"

"You were defending me," Odd said, squeezing me around the waist, "I would do the same for you if someone was calling you names like she was calling me. I'll always protect you, and you protect me."

I nodded but the dream from the previous night flashed in my mind and I shivered. Odd noticed and held me tighter, as if to warm me.

The day went by slowly, I didn't see Sissi anywhere; she was probably hiding out in her room. Odd told me that she had a cast on her nose. Ulrich finally came home that night and the five of us hung out in his and Odd's room and we all talked about our Holiday. Ulrich seemed quiet, since he hadn't really done anything fun. He didn't stop us from talking about our fun though.

"So you punched Sissi in the face?" Ulrich asked me, eyes wide with surprise. "I would have never pegged you as the fighting type."

"I'm not! She made me so mad last night!" I exclaimed. "I felt so bad about it after… Yolanda wants me to see her once a week for anxiety control."

"Hopefully that doesn't interfere with Lyoko business," Jeremie said, crossing his fingers. "Speaking of which…"

"We get to go play on Lyoko?" Odd asked excited. "I miss Lyoko!"

I rolled my eyes. "I think you just miss your Overboard."

"I have a vehicle for you, Emma," Jeremie interrupted. "Aelita and I developed it over the break. We think you'll like it. We've christened it The Overmorph."

"We want to go to Lyoko so everybody can practice on each other's vehicles, that way we're all familiar with them just in case one of you need to ride someone else's vehicle," Aelita told us. "The new vehicle should be easy enough."

I raised an eyebrow but they wouldn't say more about it. I rolled my eyes and spoke up. "Well hopefully X.A.N.A. doesn't attack tomorrow. I've got detention after school," I told them. "After detention I'll go to the factory. For now, I think I'll go to my room. I want to send a letter home."

"You still write letters?" Ulrich asked. Odd gave him a look and he made a slight choking noise and held up his hands. "I mean, it's nice you still write letters…"

I smiled. "It's fine, Ulrich. I do wish I had a cell phone though, it seems that would help if X.A.N.A. attacked and we need to stay in touch…"

"Emma, let's go to your room together," Aelita offered. "We haven't really had a chance to talk, just us girls, yet."

So we left the room, kissing our respective boyfriends goodnight. While we were walking up the stairs, I thought about cell phones, then I thought about my dream. It was eating at me, I had to ask:

"Aelita? Has X.A.N.A. ever attacked any of you… sexually?" I bit my lip, blushing when I asked. She stopped walking then and looked at me, confusion on her face.

"No, I don't think X.A.N.A. quite grasps the concept of sex, or erotic behavior. I think X.A.N.A. has a very literal knowledge of the human body, probably only thinks of sex as a way to reproduce, not a way to attack someone. Why do you ask?"

"I had a dream the other night… X.A.N.A. possessed a man and he chased me through the art building and trapped me in a dark room… I was totally alone and I couldn't contact any of you," I paused. She was watching me closely, worry written in her eyes. "He raped me. Someone tried getting to me then but it was too late. I woke up and couldn't get back to sleep…"

"Oh, my!" She hugged me. She let go and pulled me along with her and we went into my room. We sat on my bed. "That sounds like it was a horrible nightmare!"

I nodded weakly. "I don't understand it… I've never had a dream nearly as.. erotic, and I've never even dreamed a X.A.N.A. dream either. Usually my dreams are just vague dreams of whatever I did the day before. I never have weird dreams."

"Well it's over, and I don't think it's likely that X.A.N.A. would make that sort of attack," Aelita assured me. "But if you're still worried, I suggest you just avoid being alone. I think that's all you can really do at this point."

"Alright," I told her. "You want to hang out for a bit while I write my letter? I won't be long," I told her. I went to my desk and pulled a piece of paper out of a notebook and started writing. She just sat on my bed and read a book I had on the floor, it was a French version of a comic book from America. Spider Man. Odd had lent it to me.

When I finished writing my letter Aelita and I talked for a few hours, discussing such topics as her love life, my love life, Lyoko, X.A.N.A. , music, and film. She thought it was a great idea for me to join the Cinema Club. She also suggested I check out her new music mix sometime. I told her I would and when we seemed to be out of things to talk about, she left my room to go to bed, I changed out of my day clothes and into my sleeping attire and went to sleep as well, finding it much easier than the night before.

I had the same dream, only this time I wasn't in the Studio; I was in the forest, just outside of a house. I woke up in a cold sweat and saw that it was only 4:32 in the morning.

I gritted my teeth. "Is this going to become a habit of mine?" I muttered. I rolled onto my belly and managed to get another hour of sleep before I went to the showers to clean up before breakfast. When I finished my shower there were girls staring at me, Sissi lingered in the background and I understood why the other girls were staring apprehensively at me. I ignored them as I brushed my teeth and washed my face. I decided to brush my hair in my room. I thought about the dream the whole time I spent getting ready for the day. And then I left, trying to put on a smile to hide my uneasiness.


	13. Practice Day

The cafeteria wasn't much different, people moved out of my way in line and I found that nobody said anything to me; normally people would make friendly conversation in line and now nobody said a word. I sat down at my usual table and the cafeteria seemed to go back to chattering noisily. Odd, Aelita, Jeremie, and Ulrich joined me slowly and finally, Yumi showed up. She chatted about her trip to Japan and asked us all how our breaks were.

The morning went by slowly and I realized just how hard it was to readjust to school after a break. Everyone else seemed to be feeling the same way. When lunch came around three girls approached me, looking concerned, interested, and skeptical.

"So, Sissi is going around telling people you attacked her," one of them said. "If you haven't noticed…"

"I have noticed," I told her. I recognized her as a grade younger than me, she was shorter and had blonde hair.

"It's not true, is it?" another of the girls asked.

"It is, she was provoking me. She was trying to upset me about my relationship with Odd," I told them. They gave each other a look and I knew what was coming next.

"I hear he dated two girls at the same time, once," said the third girl matter-of-factly.

"He did." I said just as quickly. "But he's grown more mature since then. I wish everyone would mind their own business. Goodbye, girls." And that was the end of that.

The rest of lunch and classes went on in the same way as the morning. When it came time for me to serve my detention, Jim herded me into the cafeteria and told me that I would help Rosa clean and prepare for the next day.

I was fine with that. Rosa started me off washing and sterilizing trays. I filled the basin with soapy water and got to work. She and I were the only two people working. Half an hour of cleaning trays later and I was done. Rosa assigned me to cleaning the pantry room, which was in a state of extreme disorganization.

"This should take you to the end of your punishment," she told me and I nodded, trying to decide where to start. I walked in and closed the door behind me. I started my setting everything off of the shelves and onto the floor. I started off organizing spices and seasoning alphabetically on the top shelves. Then I organized the dry pasta/rice/noodles in the same way, dumping open boxes in Tupperware containers and getting rid of the old boxes. I organized the rest of the stuff according to type, alphabet, and size. I finished a little bit after I was due to leave. I had no way of knowing since I didn't have a clock to reference.

When I left the pantry, Odd was sitting in the cafeteria waiting for me. I raised an eyebrow and he pointed at the clock. I smiled and walked back into the kitchen to tell Rosa I was done, and that I was leaving.

"How long have you been waiting for me?" I asked Odd as we left.

"Well I came in ten minutes before you were going to be done… so thirty three minutes," he told me.

"Oh, I'm sorry," I blushed. "I didn't know you were going to come… I would have kept an eye on the time."

"Don't worry about it. You ready to check out your new vehicle? It's really cool!"

We went to the factory and I saw that everyone was already on Lyoko, fooling around on the vehicles.

"First, let me explain your vehicle," Jeremie said before I could go down to the scanners. "It's polymorphic depending on what the rider needs. So it can be a raft, say if you fall over the edge. It can sit on top of the digital sea. The only problem is you'd need to wait for someone else to come get you or I would have to rematerialize you; you can't get back onto the sector on your own. Say if you need to fly, you can will it to turn into an Overboard like Odd's, or an Overwing if you want a more stable ride…"

"The overboard is a million times more fun, though," Odd interjected. Jeremie rolled his eyes and continued.

"Based on your needs, the Overmorph will transform. It's true form is that of a skateboard, it's a land bound Overboard with jets. It even allows you to be as fast, if not faster than Ulrich when he super sprints."

"Wow, you think I can handle that kind of vehicle?" I asked him.

"I designed it so it would be very user friendly. You can even call it to you if you need it in a flash. I programmed this into all of the vehicles to help you guys out of a jam; I don't need to virtualize them for you anymore."

I nodded. "So I'll go try it out. Do we have anything we need to get done on Lyoko or are we just testing out the vehicles?"

"Just a practice day. Go to the scanners, both of you." Odd saluted in response and we took the elevator down to the scanner room. I got in across from Odd and Jeremie virtualized the two of us.

He sent us to the desert sector. Ulrich was there already screwing around on the Overwing and Yumi was on the Overboard, while Aelita was on the Overbike. My vehicle was sitting right in front of me. It was an orange skateboard with two small rocket jets on the back of it. There was black webbing like that matched my suit.

"Cool. It matches you," Odd said. He was watching Yumi carefully as she attempted to maneuver the Overboard. "Yumi! No offense but I think you'd be a terrible surfer!" he called to her. She flipped him off in confutation. He laughed.

"So, Jeremie how do I do this?" I asked, stepping onto the skateboard. I kicked at the ground and rode around on it the way I would a normal skateboard.

"Just get a feel for it. When you want it to go faster, it will activate the jets. When you want it to go airborne, just concentrate and it will ascend." Jeremie explained to me. "If you need it to morph into another vehicle, it will do that; It takes a minute, but it does. I'm going to work on making the morphing process faster in case of emergencies."

I saw Odd take over his Overboard and concentrated on becoming airborne. The jets fired up and I fought to keep my balance as the board rose. The downside to the polymorphic skateboard was there wasn't much foot room. I caught up to Odd easily and caught his eye.

"Race?" I asked him and sped up ahead of him. "It'll give me a chance to practice!"

"But I feel like I have an unfair advantage," Odd responded, catching back up to me.

I willed the skateboard to morph into the Overboard. It looked the same except it had the black webbing designed over dark orange. "Now we're evenly matched," I replied and sped off ahead of him. "First one to the way tower wins!" I called behind me.

"That'll be me!" he called. The next second he came up from below me and pulled up really close, jumping onto my board and giving me a kiss on the cheek before flipping back onto his board and speeding up ahead of me. I shook my head, rolled my eyes and kicked it into high gear. I leaned forward and willed the board to go into hyper speed.

The jets on the back roared and the board picked up instant speed and I found myself passing Odd, I stuck my tongue out at him and spotted the way tower, picking up more and more speed as I reached it. When I got there I tapped it and jumped off of the mock Overboard. It returned to its original state.

"That's not fair!" Odd whined, stopping in front of me. "I don't have the super speed. Hey, Einstein, why don't I have the super speed?"

"I'm just testing it on Emma's vehicle first," was Jeremie's response. "The Overboard goes fast enough for now."

Odd pouted and I laughed, "Nah, nah," I teased. "I'm faster than you!"

"I wonder, are you faster than me?" Ulrich asked, approaching us on his Overbike. Yumi and Aelita followed on the Overwing.

"Guys, you're supposed to be training on each other vehicle. Everyone rotate now; Ulrich on the Overboard, Odd on the Overwing, Yumi on the Overmorph, and Emma on the Overbike. Aelita, monitor everyone and make sure Odd doesn't destroy the Overwing," Jeremie chuckled at the end. He knew Odd wouldn't like the Overwing much.

So we drove around on each other's vehicles for a while, raising hell in the desert region. It was unanimously agreed that we all preferred our own vehicles. Everyone went back to riding their own vehicle and we decided to have a real race between me, Odd, and Ulrich. We would all split into different sectors and end up in the mountain sector, where Yumi and Aelita would be waiting. I had to start in the forest. Ulrich was going to start in the polar region. Odd was going to stay in the desert region. We all had to start at the northern most part of the sector. Jeremie waited until we were all there before he started the ready, set, go.


	14. The Race

"Ready, get set… go!" Jeremie shouted. He watched as three green dots began to move. Each heading for the proper way tower. He thought this was a bit childish but he did get a good chance to observe the Overmorph with this race. So far he saw how it rode in the desert region, but now Jeremie could observe it in the forest and mountain sectors. Of course he would have them move back to the polar region so he could observe it there. There was also the matter of checking to make sure it would float on the digital sea.

He watched the three green dots move through their sectors; the most operatic dot was Odd, Ulrich seemed to be being a bit reckless as well. Emma, on the other hand, seemed to be totally focused. She kept the vehicle in its original form and kept it on the ground. She was doing really well, being the first to change sectors. Odd was right behind her, and Ulrich right behind him.

Ulrich sped up in the tower, passing Odd and trying to pass Emma but she kept moving in front of him to stay in front. She burst out of the tower and glanced behind her to keep an eye on the competition. Ulrich was right on her heels and Odd was struggling to keep up with both of them. He started to focus more and caught up finally to Ulrich, who glared in front of him, determined to catch up to Emma.

"Incoming, Yumi," Jeremie said as the three sped closer and closer to the finish line. Yumi held her fan up above her head as if it were a checkered flag. Aelita waited with anticipation from the sky.

Emma rounded the corner first, as expected; Ulrich rounded it second. Odd looked at the small rock mountain that blocked his path to the finish line. He pointed his board upward and shot himself up, and then down the mountain, managing to drop down in front of Emma.

"You big cheater!" Emma hollered at him and kicked her Overmorph into hyper speed. She passed Odd again and passed the finish line. Odd passed it second and Ulrich pulled in third. Emma whooped and gave Aelita a high five. Yumi teased Ulrich about losing and he shrugged.

"I knew I was going to lose, that hyper speed of hers is wicked," he announced. "I feel bad for Odd though, he's a sore loser."

"Am not! The only reason she won is because of that booster, if she had the same speed as us we would have been equally matched!" Odd exclaimed.

"Okay, Odd, I get it, I'll make your board faster. Everyone go to the Ice Sector. I want to see how the Overmorph does there and test the last feature on it," Jeremie told them all. "I want to check to make sure it floats on the sea."

The five of them made their way toward the tower, Odd and Emma were bickering about the race, Yumi and Aelita were comparing judgment on the race, and Ulrich was riding solo, watching the sector carefully.

"Hey Jeremie, where's all of X.A.N.A. 's monsters? Usually they are somewhere around here hanging out," Ulrich said to Jeremie. Aelita and Yumi paused then, looking around the sector, as if realizing for the first time that X.A.N.A. had been leaving them alone all night.

"Yeah, hey what gives Jeremie? This is the longest we've been on Lyoko without a battle," Yumi stated.

"I've been running scans all night. X.A.N.A. is being really quiet. I will let you know the moment I see a monsters," Jeremie assured them.

Odd and Emma were already passing through the tower, Emma sped ahead of him and passed into the ice sector and stopped.

"Jeremie?" she called. "You're not going to like hearing this… your scanner is busted! There are five megatanks waiting for us."


	15. What Happened?

"What?!" Jeremie asked. "I can't see them on the screen." The others caught up to Emma and immediately went on the offensive.

"Everyone take one and destroy it; we can get rid of these bowling balls," Ulrich commanded. And the battle began; everyone ran in separate directions and had a megatank all to themselves.

**-Emma's Point of View-**

I gritted my teeth, I hated megatanks! They were probably the most annoying to fight. I ran toward an icy waterfall and jumped onto a floating piece of ice, taking aim for the megatank. Now it couldn't try rolling closer to me because it would fall into the icy water. It blasted a wall of laser at me and I shot a bullet at it before backflipping onto another block of ice, further back. I was closer and closer to the waterfall, I almost couldn't even see the megatank. I heard it explode though. My laser bullet had hit the target on the first blow? I thought for a moment about how it was almost too easy.

I shook it off, it was just amazing shooting! "Who's the boss?" I asked and did a victory dance. Odd's rubbing off on me, I thought. Oh well.

"Okay, Emma, I'm trying to reboot my program for finding monsters, but it's not working. … get back to the group and help them out. They are telling me that Aelita and Odd are having trouble with their megatank friends..."

I nodded, trying to find a near enough chunk of ice to jump onto to get back to the group,, but there wasn't one. I cursed under my breath and called my Overmorph over, it was just outside of the waterfall cave.

Just as it arrived I heard a noise from behind me and turned around. A big jelly fish floated from behind the waterfall and approached me. "Jeremie, what kind of monster is this?" I asked him, taking aim and firing at the monster. I knew it couldn't be a very nice one. "I'm kind of stranded with it and it isn't going away... it looks like a jellyfish?" It was the best description I could think of for the beast.

"What!? I'm sending Ulrich and Yumi, try aiming for the tentacles! X.A.N.A. wants something from you and the Scyphozoa is here to get it."

I did what he said and tried aiming for the tentacles with no avail. The creature proceeded in wrapping its tentacles around me and I struggled for a minute before it attached three to my head and I couldn't do anything to fight it off. A moment later it released me and I fell onto my vehicle, it had turned into the Overwing. The vehicle carried me out of the cave where Ulrich and Yumi were just about to rush in.

"Emma!" Yumi shook me and I opened my eyes and shook my head, feeling fuzzy brained. "What happened?" Yumi asked.

"Jeremie said the Scyphozoa had you!" Ulrich said, scanning the perimeter. At that moment Odd bounded in, stood over me, concerned. Aelita was overhead, flying with her pink wings.

"It did…" I told them. "It picked me up for a second and then just dropped me. It was weird."

"You don't feel like doing X.A.N.A.'s dirty work, do you?" Odd asked me. "Every time X.A.N.A. sicks the Scyphozoa on someone, they usually end up X.A.N.A.-fied and they try doing something nasty on Lyoko."

I shook my head, "No, I feel totally fine, I don't feel like doing any X.A.N.A. stuff. Can we go home though? I've had enough fun for one night," I told them. Ulrich and Yumi nodded, agreeing. Odd helped me to stand up even though I didn't need it, and Aelita descended and deactivated her wings.

Jeremie rematerialized Ulrich, Yumi, and Aelita first. He brought Odd and I in after the scanners were available. Everyone was gathered around my scanner, as if preparing for me to fall out of it. I stepped out carefully, taking a deep breath. I assured them that the discomfort was the normal kind from every return trip home.

Back in the super calculator room, Jeremie was inspecting my digital character to see what the Scyphozoa had done. I had rematerialized just fine, I didn't feel like doing nasty X.A.N.A. business, and I didn't show any sign of having anything implanted or removed. I did, however, feel like I was starving to death.

Odd took me to a supermarket and we got a loaf of bread, some cheese, and a whole mess of other stuff and ran back to Kadic, barely dodging the attention of adults; they weren't actually allowed to bring food into the dorms.

"It felt so weird," I started when we got to his room. Ulrich, Jeremie, and Aelita were all in the room with us and we were passing the food around. "What is that Scyphozoa usually used for?"

"Usually X.A.N.A. uses it to attack Aelita. Earlier on, for example, he used the Scyphozoa to steal her memory," Jeremie explained. I blinked back surprise and nodded. "It didn't do that to you, obviously," Jeremie added, noticing my reaction. "It didn't do anything, from what I can see."

"That's strange that X.A.N.A. would send the Scyphozoa after Emma and not even do anything," Aelita said thoughtfully. "When he did that to Yumi, he took a DNA sequence code, he didn't do anything this time…"

"That X.A.N.A. can do some pretty nasty shit," I speculated, taking a bite of my sandwich. At that moment the door burst open and Jim was there, fuming. I blushed and swallowed my bite, almost without chewing at all. Thank god it was a small bite…

Jim promptly began yelling at all of us, especially Aelita and I, for being up past curfew. He watched as Odd and Ulrich cleaned up all of the food and escorted Aelita and I to our rooms, where he gave us each a final lecture about how following rules was a crucial skill, something that saved his life when he worked as a construction worker in Spain, when I asked him about it he quieted and shook his head.

"I'd rather not talk about it. Now go to bed!" he ordered, sending me into my room. I turned and faced my room, I saw the letter I'd gotten earlier in the day and decided now was a good time to open it.

I sat on the bed and tore the flap of the envelope and started to read, my fathers familiar handwriting made me smile and the faint scent of tobacco lingered on the paper. He informed me that he'd moved up in his new job in Slovakia and Aunt Barbara was getting better. Other than that, he mostly just commented and congratulated me on my accomplishments at Kadic. He was very interested to hear about my friends and more about the trip to Italy.

I sat down at my desk and started writing about my friends, each of them, in more detail. I wrote the most about Odd and added at the end how much I loved him. When I was done writing I folded the paper over a small stack of photos from Italy and wrote out the addresses and stuck a stamp on the fresh envelope. I set the letter down on my desk and changed into my night cclothes, crawling into bed and falling asleep within minutes.

Tonights dream was a near complete repeat of the first horrible dream that I'd had. Except now I didn't wake up before the rape was finished, I woke up when it was over and I was left to bleed and sob in the dark room. This time the door opened and I saw Odd, staring unfeeling at me.

Then I woke up, crying and disoriented. I looked at the clock and gasped, Breakfast was nearly over; I had five minutes to get ready and get to class. I fell out of bed and ran to my armoire, pulling at clean clothes to pull on. I deodorized and sprayed myself with the lavender perfume I'd gotten in Italy and ran into the bathroom to brush my teeth really quick and I pulled my hair into a messy bun and went back to my room to get my book bag. I just barely made it to class before the bell rang.

Odd, Jeremie, Ulrich, and Aelita gave me a weird look as I took my seat next to Odd and put my head down on the desk.

"Have you been crying?" Odd asked me quietly as the teacher started talking.

I nodded, trying to calm down and steady my heart rate. "Bad dream," I told him, trying not to recall the details.

Odd nodded and put an arm around my waist. "Try to sleep now, the teacher won't notice."

So I did, I tried to just rest my eyes for the period. I kept seeing the face of the man flash behind my eyelids and finally, I started to feel the pain of him doing his deed for real and I groaned and felt my body shake with fear and agony.

"Miss. Kozlov!" barked Ms. Kensington. "I hope your… Oh, Miss. Kozlov?" What started off as anger melted into worry when the teacher noticed my shaking. "Are you cold?"

I nodded when Odd shook his head. "She's not feeling well can I take her to the infirmary?" Odd asked her. I glared at him but stood up, my body still reacting to the flashes. Odd escorted me out of the room and we stopped just outside of the language arts building. He looked at me, concern on his face.

"I've been having nightmares," I started with a sigh. "and they are getting more and more brutal… it started on the last night we were in Sanremo," I told him. I remembered that dream hadn't been very bad, it hadn't had any rape or violence, it was just scary… I barely even remembered the details. "And then they started getting really bad when I spent the night in the infirmary."

"What kind of nightmares?" He asked and I explained in as little detail as I could. My voice broke toward the end when I started crying at the thought of it all. He pulled me into a hug and held me until I stopped.

"You said the man is X.A.N.A.-fied?" He asked.

I nodded. "I told Aelita about the first nightmare, she said X.A.N.A. wouldn't be likely to attack in such a way. She said the only knowledge of sex he has deals with reproduction, not emotion."

Odd looked thoughtful and didn't say anything for a minute. I cleared my throat and turned toward the building. "I'm okay now, I think we should go back to class," I said to him.

We did just that, listening to Ms. Kensington prattle on about The Odyssey, and receiving worried glances from Ulrich, Aelita, and Jeremie. After class, they tried asking me about the shaking and the groaning, but I just dismissed their questions and assured them that I was fine. Odd ignored them completely; he was in a sour mood. The rest of the morning went on in a blur. I refused to let myself drift to sleep, despite how tired I was. When lunch rolled around, Jeremie offered me his portion of lunch since He wanted to go check things out on Lyoko, and everyone else watched me with worried eyes. I was getting a little annoyed at them.

"Guys, I'm fine, and you don't need to worry about me," I said to them sternly. "I'm just really tired. I slept poorly last night. It happens to everyone."

After lunch I drank two coffees from the vending machine outside and managed to stay focused through the rest of my classes.

After classes were over I met Odd and the Cinema club in the studio art building. The director, Mr. Chardin, interviewed me to assess what I could bring to the film club and concluded I should be an equipment manager, starting off in maintenance and working my way up. He then lectured me on the importance of the cameras, referencing fine art and how much it relies on the use of cameras nowadays. I tried to stay focused on him, but he rambled a bit.

"Hey, in no time you'll be the one shooting my films, we can work together," Odd said to me when Chardin left me alone. I nodded and smiled. "I started off worse than that, I started off by "interning," meaning I ran around doing all of the things he didn't feel like doing. It was pretty bad."

"I'm sure it wasn't. He sounds like a perfectionist, so he probably still did most things himself," I reasoned. Odd shook his head.

"No, he made me do it and yelled at me for screwing up, every time," he assured me. "It was good for me though, sticking around for the dirty work shows him how devoted you are. He'll like you a lot more after you do this."

So Odd and another student, a 10th grader, showed me to the supply room where all of the cameras were currently stored. The tenth grade girl explained the responsibilities I would have, and she had me do a few tasks under her supervision so she could see if I was competent.

After film club was officially over for the day, Chardin charged into the supply room and asked me if I could clean all of the cameras the next day during lunch; they needed them for a production that the tenth graders would be doing after lunch. I agreed, remembering what Odd had said. Chardin looked pleasantly surprised. Odd was disappointed, but when I told him I liked spending time with the cameras, he was content.

"I'll help you," he offered as we sat down on the bench that we normally met at. "That way we can get it done faster and still get lunch!"

I shook my head. "No, you just go to lunch and I'll see you when I finish. I'd rather do it myself so Chardin sees how "devoted I am," I said using air quotes around the word devoted.

Jeremie and Aelita approached then, hand in hand. Aelita sat down beside me and Jeremie next to her. "We have some great news!" Jeremie announced.

"The Subsonics need a new DJ and they called for Aelita personally?" Odd guessed.

Aelita rolled her eyes. "Wouldn't that be amazing? But no. Jeremie and I are going to be co-valedictorians because we have the same grade point average."

Odd's eyes widened with feigned shock. "Really? The Einstein couple is going to be c-co-valedictorians? Didn't see that coming," he said sarcastically. He laughed at his own joke and I giggled; he was really cute when he did that. He was standing behind the bench where I sat. I brought my arms up and hugged his waist backwards. He put his arms around my neck and kissed the top of my head.

"You two are really getting serious, aren't you?" Aelita asked, admiring the act of affection.

"How long have we been dating?" I wondered, trying to think. A lot has happened since I came to Kadic.

"A few weeks, give or take," Odd confirmed. "With returns to the past and a hectic life style… it's hard to say. It feels like much longer, though."

I agreed. "It's been really amazing. You've all made my transition here so much better. I can't imagine how horrible Kadic would be without all of you."

"X.A.N.A. and all?" Aelita asked. I nodded.

"X.A.N.A. might be a pain in the ass but without X.A.N.A. we might not be so close…" I explained.

"That reminds me, I still want to test out the Overmorph's floating on the digital sea," Jeremie said. "Can we go tomorrow during lunch?"

I shook my head, "Have someone else test it. I'm going to be doing some maintenance work on the cameras for film club at lunch," I explained. "Odd can test it, can't you, love?" I asked, looking up at him.

"No sweat," Odd said. "Ulrich will have fun pushing me into the digital sea."

"Knowing you you'll jump off before giving him the pleasure," Aelita laughed.

"So it's settled, we'll meet at the factory for lunch," Jeremie said. "Odd since you're so kindly offering yourself as a guinea pig, you can eat before you come."

"Yay, food!" Odd cheered. "Speaking of food, I smell mashed potatoes!" he jumped off the bench, pulling me with him.


	16. This Wasn't a Dream

The next morning was a near perfect repeat of the morning before; the nightmare was the same brutality from the night before. I did manage to load up on coffee before my first class so I stayed awake and I made sure to put on a strong front so my friends wouldn't worry. After my last class before lunch I had a quick snack from the vending machine and ordered a coffee to take with me to the Studio Art department. I sat in the artist lounge and finished it and went to find Chardin to tell him I was reporting for duty.

Nobody was in the building at all, "Everyone's at lunch," I reminded myself. I looked around the building one last time, making certain that I was the only one here, and I locked all of the doors from the inside so no one could sneak up on me. The only door I left open was the main doors, just because I wasn't sure if I was allowed to lock those.

I went into the supply room and took the box of cameras from the shelf, a cleaning kit, and a chair, and sat down in the corner and got to work.

Half way through I heard a noise coming from the hallway and stopped working. I watched the door, thinking that maybe Mr. Chardin had come back from lunch early. After a moment of silence I went back to work, guessing that he was collecting his thoughts before the production of the film they were going to work on after lunch. I glanced at the clock and saw I only had ten minutes left to finish, and kicked it into high gear.

The door burst open then and I nearly jumped out of my skin. I felt a scream rise up in my throat.

It was the man from my nightmares. He was X.A.N.A.-fied. I screamed.

I looked around, seeing that I was already backed into a corner. His fingers glowed and I felt the sting of electricity course through my body. The camera in my hands shattered into millions of pieces of glass, metal, and plastic; pieces of the camera pierced my arms and my face. The man sent another charge of electricity at me and I felt more pain. I was woozy, and he knew it. He knew I couldn't escape. I looked around again and saw the closed door that stood across from the door he stood in front of. If I could just get out through that door…

I threw the bottle of cleaning solution at him and made a break for it, grabbing the door handle and flinging the door open in a desperate attempt to get out. On the otherside of the door was a wall of windows; someone would see I was in trouble and come help me.

I was pushed down by a third blast of electricity then and a second scream broke through my lips. The man was upon me then, holding my arms down, grinning. He touched my crotch over my pants and I felt chills. Crying, I pleaded for him to stop, I pleaded X.A.N.A. to stop, I'd do anything.

He ignored it, tearing my pants down. I felt the pain pierce my conscious and screamed louder and louder, until he covered my mouth with his hand.

This wasn't a dream.

Where's Odd? Still at the factory? Hopefully deactivating the tower.

As I thought it the man collapsed on me and I felt him being thrown off of me and saw Ulrich and Odd, horror-struck. They didn't seem to know what to do. I curled into a ball and stayed there, sobbing into the bright light that took us back into the past.

* * *

**A/N: Very short, very tragic chapter. I hope that didn't suck! (in terms of writing... I know what happens in the chapter sucks pretty bad...)**


	17. I Have to Get This Pain Out

When I looked around, I saw it was the morning again. I gathered my bathroom stuff in a daze and left my room. I walked into the empty bathroom and went to the shower room. I turned the water on and looked down at my body, feeling absolutely disgusting. I felt dirty and no matter how much I scrubbed, no matter how many times I went over, it wasn't enough. It never would be.

I thought of the events of X.A.N.A. 's attack and felt my knees grow weak, I lowered myself into a squatting position and hugged my knees, burying my face and crying, long and hard. Why hadn't I been more aware? Why was I so stupid? Sitting in a corner of a small room all alone? What the fuck was going through my head that I thought I was safe? Especially when there were noises coming from the halls…

I looked up and felt the pain again, all over my body.

I have to get this pain out, I thought defiantly. I reached for my shower supplies, knocking my shampoo and conditioner out of the way, trying to find something, anything…

There. My shaving razor. I uncapped it and ran it along my wrists roughly, digging into my flesh until red ran down my arms. I sobbed some more and continued on my other arm. This was actually helping… I thought quietly.

"Emma!" Aelita's voice startled me and I dropped the razor. I looked up to see her and Yumi looking into my shower. Aelita ran in and turned the water off. Yumi handed her my towel and Aelita covered me up. Yumi ran out of the shower room and returned with paper towels from the bathroom and went to work stopping the blood on my wrists.

I just sat there, quietly crying.

When Yumi was satisfied that the blood was under control, they dried me off some more and grabbed my stuff, leading me out of the bathroom, into my room. I saw that Ulrich, Jeremie, and Odd were standing in the hallway, the same horror in their eyes. Aelita made them wait a minute longer and the two girls proceeded to dress me, sporadically shoving on different garments. Aelita let the boys in and Odd rushed at me, embracing me tight. I just sat on my bed, tuked into his grasp. Yumi found my first aid kit and started dressing my cuts. Nobody spoke.

"I'm so sorry," I said after Yumi finished. "It turns out I am pretty helpless."

Odd hugged me tighter, if that was possible. He was crying, I could feel it. "You had something new a horrible happen to you," Jeremie said softly. "While we were on Lyoko, we went to Sector Five to see what the Scyphozoa did to you. We saw that all it did was access your subconscious. It turns out that X.A.N.A. had been slowly tampering with your subconscious through the scanner, and the Scyphozoa just sped up the process and gave X.A.N.A. a more clear visual. Odd and Aelita told us about your nightmares and we made the connection. Unfortunately we made the connection too late."

I just stared at the floor in front of me. Ulrich cleared his throat. "Odd and I came back, we came to the school and found that there was a lock down in the cafeteria because a madman escaped the jail nearby. When we saw that you weren't in the cafeteria we went straight to the art building. We saw through the window, you trying to escape the man and ran in to try to help, but it was too late… And then Aelita deactivated the tower."

"And you… doing that to yourself, I think that's playing right into X.A.N.A.'s wishes," Yumi said to me. I looked up then, thinking about that.

"That bastard," I whispered. I uncurled myself and moved out of Odd's hold, looking at all of them. "Why me?"

"X.A.N.A. might see that you have different anxieties, or he might have picked at random," Aelita said.

"Or X.A.N.A. just wanted to pick on the new girl because she's weak," I fumed. "That piece of shit violated me to make me want to die? The dirty little…"

"Maybe X.A.N.A. realizes what a threat you are, maybe he sees how strong you can be," Odd suggested. "You can be a major badass. He's afraid of you and he tried the most devastating method first: attacking you based on your anxiety."

"Either way," I muttered. "X.A.N.A. is fucking going down."

But I wondered in my gut, if I actually believed that.

* * *

**A/N:Sorry, another gruesome chapter. I promise there won't be a lot of these!**


	18. Therapeutic

The day repeated itself as it did before, only this time Odd insisted on helping me with the cameras. Ulrich got to test the Overmorph on the digital sea. When Odd and I finished we went to lunch and had the last two hamburgers and fries that Rosa had. We had slices of Cheesecake for dessert and cherry soda to drink. We were the last two done with our food. We didn't talk much, both still thinking about the happenings from the X.A.N.A. attack and the morning that shadowed. I had on a sweater to cover the bandages Yumi had wrapped around my arms so nobody would see and ask questions.

Sissi tried to pester me but Odd made her leave with one contradiction of whatever she had tried to say' I hadn't really been paying attention. She didn't hesitate to make comments on how protective we were over each other before she left us. Odd slumped in his seat, barely finishing his cheesecake.

"Are you okay?" I asked him. "You're not upset about…" my voice trailed off, what would I call this, the incident? I cringed at the thought of that.

"Of course I am!" Odd shouted loudly, attracting the attention of the remaining few in the cafeteria. I stood up and grabbed his arm, dragging him out of the building and off to the side of campus. "I couldn't protect you… I broke my promise," he finished when we stopped.

"You think you need to protect me?" I asked him incredulously. "You can't seriously think you need to."

"I told my mom I would, and I don't break promises!" he exclaimed. "Even if she has no idea what you need to be protected from. She'd be so disappointed if she knew."

I stared at him, feeling a bit of rage boil inside. "I'm relieving you of your promise," I told him and turned to leave him. "I'm not a little girl that needs to be protected," I said as I walked away. When he called to me I ignored him and kept walking toward our next class. I saw that Ulrich and Aelita were already there, and I took a seat next to Ulrich.

I knew I was being a bit irrational, and I knew Odd probably thought I was mad at him, but I was really just pissed off at myself. I was mad that I couldn't just defend myself, I was furious that Odd was upset too; I didn't want him to be upset over me. I wanted to be someone he didn't need to worry about.

"No Odd?" Ulrich asked, raising an eyebrow. Odd stormed in a moment later and looked throughout the room, narrowing his eyes at me, he sat down next to Aelita. She looked at me questioningly, then looked at Ulrich, he shrugged. When Jeremie arrived a minute later, he was utterly confused. He sat down one table over and tried to talk to us to see what was wrong, but neither of us answered.

After classes ended I met with Yumi and Aelita, who wanted to hang out near the front gates before Yumi headed for home. I told them all about what was going on with Odd to see what they thought.

"I think he should lay off a little," Yumi said after I finished talking. "Sure it's sweet that he wants to protect you, but you have proven that you're capable of protecting yourself. We've all fallen victim to a trap or two, it doesn't mean we need to protect each other all the time."

"Yeah, but.." Aelita looked down, kicking a small rock in front of her. "You have to think of things from his perspective, it must have been completely horrible to see you in that state yesterday," she reasoned. "If I saw any of you… raped like that… I'd feel an intense will to protect that person. Especially if it was Jeremie, I don't think I could live with myself if anything happened to him."

I thought about that. I kicked the rock that Aelita had kicked and watched it as it tumbled down the path to meet a pair of red shoes. I followed them up and stopped, locking eyes with Odd. He was standing with Jeremie and Ulrich.

"X.A.N.A. is attacking," Ulrich said. Aelita and Yumi both started walking toward them and they stopped when they realized I wasn't with them. They turned and everybody's eyes were on me.

"What's he doing?" I asked Jeremie after a second. I started walking toward them and we walked as a group to the park, where we found the manhole and filed down one by one.

"No idea, we're trying to deactivate the tower before he has the chance to cause any harm," Jeremie informed me. I grabbed my skateboard and led the way to the factory. I went straight down to the scanners and stood inside of one. The others followed me down while Jeremie started up the process. Aelita and Yumi ran into the other two scanners.

"Are you sure you want to go in, Emma?" Jeremie asked from above.

"You bet," I responded. "fire it up! I'm going to make X.A.N.A. think twice before fucking with one of us like he did me again."

The scanner doors closed as Jeremie transferred, scanned, and virtualized Yumi, Aelita, and I. The Overwing and Overmorph were waiting for us in the forest sector. We watched as the Overbike and Overboard appeared. Their owner's dropped down on top of them and Aelita hopped onto the back of Ulrich's bike.

"The tower is due west," Jeremie said and I took off in that direction. Being thr fastest, I saw three tarantulas and a swarm of hornets guarding the tower. I went headfirst into the swarm and started shooting.

"Emma! Are you trying to get yourself devirtualized? You just lost forty life points. Calm down!" Jeremie yelled at me. I backed out of the swarm, happy with the three that I destroyed in my rampage. As I backed out of the swarm, one of the hornets took out my Overmorph and I flew off. I latched onto a tree though, crawling to the other side to avoid getting hit again.

"Jeremie, you must understand… This is therapeutic for me," I told him looking around the tree to assess the situation; Ulrich and Odd were working on the tarantulas. Ulrich was fighting old school with one of them and Odd was dodging attacks left and right from the other two.. Aelita and Yumi were fighting the hornets.

I decided to show Odd how much he didn't need to protect me. I leapt from my tree to another tree, closer to the action. I shot at a hornet that made itself an easy target for me by sticking out from its group. It shattered and I jumped down while one of Odd's tarantulas was distracted and jumped onto it, setting my palm on its Eye.

"Laser!" My hand flashed and I jumped off of it as it blew up. I looked at Odd and smirked. "Look who's protecting who."

"Get your head out of your ass," he hissed at me abruptly, going back to the last tarantula. He fired a laser arrow and it hit the target dead on.

"What did you just say to me?" I snarled as he turned back to me and glared at me. I stared back and considered shooting him in the face.

Before I had the chance though, we were both poisoned by hornets, and shot at once each. We both devirtualized a minute later.


	19. Independence

In the scanner room we stepped out of scanners. I had a big headache and I felt like I was boiling. I took a deep breath and sat down in the casing of the scanner, rubbing my temple. Odd stood over me, glaring down at me.

"Why are you acting like I'm being a jerk?" he demanded. "I've done nothing but help you since you came to Kadic! And I was more than happy to because I like you so much"

"And I hate that!" I erupted. "I want to be independent, and I'm not even mad at you, I'm mad at myself for failing to have that ability!"

I looked up at him and saw spots in my vision, I tried standing up to go to the elevator, but I just collapsed, my knees buckling. Odd grabbed me and lowered me back to a sitting position, not saying anything. He stood back up and walked away, not leaving the scanner room, but just sitting inside of the elevator staring at me.

I stared at the ground and mentally pleaded with it to stop spinning. I steadied my breathing and closed my eyes, trying will optimum effort to clear the anger out of my mind. I finally felt calmer and opened my eyes again, counting to five I stood up. Odd was still watching me. I walked over to the elevator and pushed the button, sitting down in front of him, cross-legged. He crossed his legs, his knees touching mine, the way we used to sit before we started dating.

"You know I really think we might have gotten too serious, too quickly. We're way too attached to each other and it's clouding our judgment, I think," I said to him when the elevator doors closed. He didn't say anything. "And I don't want to break up or go on a break or any dumb shit like that, but I think we really need to take a chill pill and relax around each other," I continued. "What do you think?"

"I think I love you," he said quietly. The doors opened and I could hear Jeremie yelling about how Yumi was devirtualized, but all of the hornets were gone. Aelita could deactivate the tower now.

"Hey, guys are you okay?" I heard Jeremie ask us; my back was to him so I couldn't see him. I assumed he was wondering why we were sitting in the elevator.

"Fine, Jeremie," I said. "Go back to monitoring Lyoko."

I touched Odd's knees and leaned forward, kissing him on the cheek. He blushed and looked up at me under his lashes. "I love you too, Odd, but what do you think about slowing this relationship down? Making it more relaxed?"

He shrugged. Yumi called the elevator then and the doors closed and we started to descend. "I think it will be hard for me. I know you hate it but I do feel protective of you, especially with your anxiety and the incident that happened…" I cringed, there we go; calling it the incident.

"I'm asking you to try though," I said to him and the elevator doors opened, revealing Yumi and Ulrich. Aelita's scanner was opening right then and she stepped out. I turned to see they were all staring at us.

"Are we interrupting a moment?" Ulrich asked, folding his arms. Yumi shot him a look and Aelita looked at us nervously.

I shook my head. "No, no you're not interrupting anything," I told them and stood up. I leaned against the wall, still feeling a little dizzy. I waited for everyone to get in before pushing the button. Odd was looking at his knees, silent. I nudged him with my foot and he looked up at me and stood. Yumi, Aelita, and Ulrich continued watching us curiously.

When the elevator reached Jeremie's floor everyone left, except for Odd, who pushed the button immediately after I stepped out. Jeremie looked at his screen and told us that Odd was going up, leaving the factory.

"What happened between you two just now?" Aelita asked me.

I bit my lip, looking at the ground. "I told him I want to slow things down and relax the relationship, and he told me he loved me." I said truthfully.

Silence followed, all except for Jeremie's typing, which never seemed to end. He always seemed indifferent to this kind of thing. "And I told him I love him too, but I still want to chill out a bit and he said he would have to try pretty hard because he feels really protective…" I finished.

"I think he's so upset because this is new for him," Ulrich informed us. "He's used to relationships being fun and relaxed but I think with you it's different, because he cares so deeply for you and because X.A.N.A. seems so fixated on you he's just stressed and worried. He's not used to that."

I nodded, "but still… doesn't he understand how hard this is for me as well?" I asked, "I mean, I came to Kadic thinking I would be able to focus on my studies to become successful later in life, but instead I'm saving the world and falling in love… I wasn't expecting any of this to happen. I've never even thought of having a boyfriend before, I was way in over my head when I started all of this," I felt the headache increase again and the hot flashes return. I sat down where I stood and closed my eyes, hoping that counting to ten would help.

Yumi bent down and hugged me, "I know this must all be so hard for you," she said soothingly. "It's all going to work out in the end, and we'll be stronger because of this."


	20. Not Okay

We left the factory then, only to see that Odd was just on the bridge, looking down at the water. We walked back to the school together, in silence. We missed dinner, like we always did, but none of us seemed to be in the mood to eat, not even Odd. in fact he didn't even talk once.

When we reached the dormitory building Odd bolted up the stairs without saying a word.

Ulrich looked back at me and rolled his eyes, clearly annoyed by the whole situation. "You're both acting like children," he said to me as he followed his roommate.

"Well hopefully you two figure things out," Jeremie told me.

"It's just so frustrating. I wish he weren't so stubborn about this… he's letting his emotions cloud his judgment," I responded, irritated. "Anyway, goodnight, Jeremie."

He gave Aelita a peck on the cheek and went up to his floor and Aelita and I walked in silence to our rooms.

Aelita hugged me before I unlocked my door and let myself into my room. I looked at the clock, it was already 7:30, and I didn't feel like sleeping and having nightmares tonight. I cracked open my textbooks and did my homework and read ahead in the text. The whole time I thought of Odd, wondering if I'd hurt him as much as he was showing, or if he was just being dramatic. It was a Della Robbia thing; dramatization.

I rolled my eyes and started writing out notes on the science chapter just for the hell of it, I looked at the clock and saw it was nearly 4 in the morning; pulling an all-nighter had proven to be easier than I thought.

Two weeks of pulling all-nighters and focusing on school and Odd seemed to spend all of his time cooped up in his room. I had no idea what he was working on. I knew that Ulrich knew but he would always just dismiss my questioning and told me to stop being paranoid. Meanwhile Aelita and Yumi caught on to my aversion to sleep and begged me to start sleeping again, telling me that they would figure out the nightmares soon enough and that they needed me to be well rested for Lyoko trips, which were going well enough even with my lack of sleep.

Of course they weren't going well because of me, it was usually Ulrich, Odd, or Yumi who saved the day. During my no-sleep period I only took out three monsters.

Which was not okay. I would need to figure out a way to perform better and top being a wimp about sleeping. I knew that avoiding sleep would only add to my problems. I desperately hoped that the nightmares would cease, and fast.

* * *

**A/N: I know this chapter was blahh. When I was breaking this up into chapters I made a mistake and made this one super short and awkward so I just tried to fix it but I don't think it did any good.**


	21. Channeling Emotion

-Odd's point of view at the ame time as ch. 20-

"She wants to slow things down," Odd mumbled into his pillow. He knew he was being ridiculous, but he felt ridiculous… ridiculously in love. Oh god, how cheesy can I get? Odd thought at himself. Odd never felt so strongly for a girl, the closest was Sam, and she'd put everyone in danger by withholding information from him. She'd also gotten Odd in trouble once because of a laptop, so all those things combined he just had to dump her; she was just too much trouble.

But this, this was trouble and more! Emma was completely crazy, vouching her love one minute, and telling Odd to cool his jets the next. She was affectionate one second and the next moment she was distancing herself… She even had the whole anxiety thing that worried the crap out of him. Odd wondered why he put up with it all.

"Because, like you said, you love her?" Ulrich asked. He was petting Kiwi, who'd been trying to get their attention since they came back to the room. "She's going through some rough things. I think right now she just needs you to be there for her, be stable for her."

"She said she wants to be independent," Odd retorted, spitting the word, glaring at his pillow.

"She doesn't seem to know what she wants," Ulrich reasoned. "You just need to play it cool, for once."

Odd looked up at Ulrich and shook his head. "I can't play it cool with her, she just brings the worst out in me sometimes. Like earlier on Lyoko, she made me so mad…"

"And you channeled that into taking X.A.N.A. 's monster out. That was a good thing. And her irritation charged her into taking out a bunch of hornets and a tarantula," Ulrich said. "Anger is a great weapon against X.A.N.A., but in the real world it's not the best way to get things done."

"You're right, I know that. I just wish there was a way I could channel my emotion to make her see how I feel." Odd thought about it and had an idea. He ran out of his room to Jeremie's room. He knocked on the door and then let himself in.

"Hey can I borrow your laptop?" he asked and took the laptop while Jeremie was still deliberating. Odd figured it was fine since he didn't chase after him. He returned to his and Ulrich's room and he plopped down on his bed with the laptop and went onto the internet, logging onto his blog.

"What are you up to?" Ulrich asked.

"Figuring things out. People on the internet are good at helping me out with this kind of thing," Odd said. He typed in his situation in a post and waited a few minutes and found that people were already starting to make suggestions. Odd saw one song suggestion: Horizons by an American band called New Horizons; Odd listened to it and spent his night translating it to Italian. It wasn't exactly what he needed, but it would definitely be a good song to learn on his guitar. He searched around the internet for other Flyleaf songs that might work for him and found a gold mine. Two songs, especially, caught his eye. Tiny Heart and Set Apart This Dream. He set to work creating an Italian mash-up of the two songs, plucking at the acoustic guitar he kept in his armoire. Once Odd had the basic rhythm of the songs he was going to play down, he put his guitar down next to his bed and lied down, his brain racing with musical notes and lyrics.

Two weeks passed and Odd spent all of his free time perfecting the two songs He'd perform for Emma. During this time, the two of them kept to themselves; an unspoken break. Several people approached him asking if they were broken up, and he told all of them that they should mind their own lives and stop bothering his. He noticed that people asked Emma questions too. She said the same thing to Sissi when she'd approached their lunch table one day.

The group didn't ask any questioned; Odd assumed that Emma told Yumi and Aelita what was going on at her end, and Ulrich knew what Odd was up to. Jeremie stayed out of it, like always. X.A.N.A. stayed pretty quiet during this time, for some reason. Odd felt a little on edge, usually if X.A.N.A. stayed quiet for more than a week it meant trouble.

Aelita told Odd one day that Emma wasn't sleeping, she was afraid to because of the nightmares. Odd wanted more than anything to ease her pain but he knew she didn't want him to. He only worked harder to perfect his surprise for her, hoping that it would help her to see how much he cared about her.

On Friday, when it came time for the Cinema Club to meet, Odd pulled Emma aside during a break, into the music room, having his guitar waiting there.

What are you doing?" Emma asked when Odd asked her to sit down in a seat. He grabbed his guitar and felt his heart fluttering. He took a deep breath and exhaled, figuring this was it.

"I've been trying to figure out how to channel my emotion toward you. I found these songs on the internet. They are from a band in America. I translated them into Italian and did some work on them. I hope you like it."

With that Odd delved into his first song; it was the mash-up between Tiny Heart and Set Apart This Dream. His eyes were locked on Emma's the whole time and he was getting nervous; he couldn't tell whether she liked it or not. When he finished he dove right into New Horizons, knowing that Chardin could burst in at any moment demanding to have their attention back.

When he finished with that song, Emma smiled at him and stood up. She bent over and pressed her lips to his and pulled away when the door burst open. Chardin was looking wildly at the two of them, holding a camera and a tripod. He shoved them at Emma.

"You two need to work on the new film! The camera man has fallen ill so you'll be filming, Emma," the director told her and she smiled happily, nodding enthusiastically.

"This is turning out to be an amazing day!" she said to both of them. Chardin discarded the statement and started directing the two of them, telling them to get back to work.

Odd pulled his phone out then, scowling. "Hey, Mr. Chardin, I just rmembered that Emma and I need to go do something," he said and he saw Emma roll her eyes.

"No! You two need to work on this!"

Emma gave me a look then and winked, "Mr. Chardin, actually I feel like I might…" she held her head, Odd could actually see her skin pale as she pretended to be sick. "I feel like I might be sick. I need to go to the infirmary."

Mr. Chardin scowled but nodded. Odd stood up, "I'll take her," he said but Chardin grabbed his arm.

"No! She's a big girl, she can take herself!" Chardin barked. "You must help with the film, we don't actually need her until tomorrow when we start filming! Go on, Emma, I hope you feel well tomorrow."

Emma nodded, "Thank you, sir. Don't worry Odd, I'll be fine." And she left.

Odd cursed inwardly and followed Chardin back to the rest of the group, where they were discussing the script.

* * *

**A/N: I hope that wasn't confusing... and I want to say that Obviously I do not own Flyleaf...**


	22. Glowing Purple

When I reached the factory, Jeremie was at the computer with Aelita at his side. I walked in, clearing my throat. They looked up at me.

"Yumi's family has been X.A.N.A.-fied," Aelita started. "They're after Ulrich and Yumi, and Yumi just told us that Hiroki just split, heading for the school; she thinks he's going to go after Odd. So it's up to us."

"Both of you get to the scanners. I hope you can handle this… I'm going to send the Overmorph and the Overboard," Jeremie told us. Aelita and I went down the ladder to the scanner room and we both entered scanners.

"Transfer: Emma. Transfer: Aelita," Jeremie started. The scanner doors closed. "Scanner: Emma. Scanner: Aelita," A light flashed up and down the scanner and Emma felt the tingling sensation as Jeremie finished. "Virtualization!" Jeremie pressed enter and Aelita and I found ourselves ascended in the mountain sector. I called my Overmorph to me and it flew up, catching me as I dropped down. Aelita did the same with the Overboard. We both just hovered for a moment while we waited for Jeremie.

"So have you and Odd talked yet about what's going on?" Aelita asked me. I felt a smile creep along my lips.

"The activated tower is just south of you. You should actually be able to see it from where you're at," Jeremie interrupted. I turned around on the Overmorph and found that he was right; I could see the red tower, but I could also see two mantas and three tarantulas.

"Jeremie, the welcoming committee looks really mean and I'm not sure if I can handle all of them," I said. I looked at Aelita, she didn't look too worried.

"Maybe we can use a diversion," she suggested. "You can try leading half of them away from the tower and we can divide and conquer."

"That could work. Aelita can use her creativity to get rid of some of the land bound monsters, maybe?" Jeremie asked. Aelita nodded and smiled at me.

"We got this!" She said, zooming forward on the Overboard.

I followed her and we both split up when the monsters spotted us; both of the mantas came after me, along with a tarantula, while the other two tarantulas followed Aelita. She went to work trying to use her creativity to create a hole in the platform underneath one of the tarantulas, not without avoiding a laser attack from the other one. She watched as the first tarantula fell through the hole and turned her attention to her other tarantula.

I, on the other hand, was acting as a pin cushion for lasers; I avoided one attack and managed to get hit by another. I took out the tarantula no problem but the mantas were a little harder.

"Emma, you only have ten life points left! Be careful!" Jeremie exclaimed. I gritted my teeth and launched myself upward, far above the mantas. I tried to get a good shot at one of them when they did a strange thing, moving together as one creature, sending a purple laser my way. I tried to dodge but it clipped my arm. I looked down to see I was still here. And I was glowing purple.

"Energy Field!" Aelita sent it flying at her last tarantula and turned her attention to me. I looked down at her, confused. She sent an energy field at the separating manta and took one of them out.

"Go deactivate the tower!" I told her, feeling a little hazy. I sent a bullet at the remaining manta and it bursted. I went down onto solid ground to wait for Aelita to finish her business. I wasn't glowing anymore, which was a good thing.

Right?

"Jeremie, what did the manta do? They fired at me and I started glowing… I didn't get devirtualized like I should have," I said to him. "Unless I actually had more life points than you thought?"

"It's really weird. I'm going to run a scan on you to see what they did," Jeremie told me. "When Aelita is done deactivating the tower, go in and I'll do it."

The tower turned back to its neutral color and I walked in, nearly falling off the edge of the first platform. I balanced myself in the center of the straight path and walked toward the middle as Aelita was coming back down. She told me to stand in the center and relax. I felt myself hovering in the next second and felt like I was in the scanner, a light scanned me up and down and my body tingled a little.

"Look, I don't see anything… But that doesn't mean something isn't wrong…" Jeremie informed me as I lowered back down next to Aelita. "It looks like it's safe to bring you in so I'm going to do that. I'm going to launch a return to the past."

He rematerialized Aelita and I and I felt a blinding pain erupt in my head while I was in the scanner; when the doors opened I fell to the floor, passed out.

* * *

**A/N: Geez, Emma, not having the best of luck with being a Lyoko Warrior, are you?**


	23. Trapped

Nightmares. I felt horribly vivid nightmares. I had every fear and anxiety relived through nightmares. First I witnessed the death of each friend I had, either on Lyoko or in the real world. Jeremie was first, being liquidated by a X.A.N.A.-fied classmate while the rest of us were ok Lyoko. I remember having Aelita devirtualize me and Odd so we could go help him, but we got there too late. Jeremie was limp in his chair with a X.A.N.A.-fied Emily standing over him laughing her delight.

When the dream changed, Jeremie was alive, but this time Yumi was the one being killed; she and I were fighting against a X.A.N.A.-fied escaped convict who had a gun. We were in the forest near Kadic and we were alone. Before I knew it, Yumi was on the ground, a pool of blood forming beneath her. My screaming was drowned out by his wicked laughter.

Ulrich was next, he, Aelita, and I were on Lyoko; surrounded by monsters. He tried to be the hero, using his body as a shield to protect Aelita from a Megatank's wall of fire. He was pushed over the edge of the digital sea and I wasn't fast enough to get to him in time.

Aelita's death was horrible, it was like the rape nightmares I always had. Except she and I were together, both being violated. The only difference was after he was done with her, he killed her. When I screamed he looked over at me, X.A.N.A.-fied eyes dancing, and violated me again, but wouldn't kill me. Just made me suffer, looking at her dead, bloody, burned body.

Odd was last, and the worst.

He and I were on Lyoko, fighting the last battle we fought together. When we were both devirtualized, the scene replayed where we argued about how protective he was. When I got to the elevator and we talked, more calmly.

"I think I love you," he said to me, looking up at me. I embraced him in a hug, I thought I was going to embrace what he'd told me.

"I love you too, Odd, but…" at that moment I raised my arm, knife in hand, and dug it deep into his body, directly where his heart was. I felt his body go limp as his blood dripped down onto my arms, onto the floor.

I smiled in the dream.

I screamed in my sleep.

* * *

**A/N: Yeah... Guess there is more brutality than I remembered. I'm pretty messed up when I am writing within a time frame.**


	24. An Idea

Odd, Ulrich, Yumi, and Aelita were frantic; Emma wasn't waking up, and they could tell she was in pain, given the expression on her face. Jeremie was talking with Yolanda, telling her that Emma had passed out while taking a walk in the forest with them. They didn't know why, she'd been fine earlier.

Odd stared down at Emma and felt his heart break for her pain; he felt terrible guilt for letting her go to Lyoko alone, even though he knew that he hadn't had any choice. And she'd wanted to go alone.

He saw her expression change from grieving to horror stricken and her mouth opened and a scream escaped her lips and she started shuddering. Odd fell onto the bed, holding her, willing her pain to go away. He stroked her hair, looking at her face, feeling totally helpless.

Yolanda and Jeremie burst into the room and Yolanda called an ambulance

Odd looked up at his friends, Aelita was hysterical, Yumi was solemn, Ulrich was angry, and Jeremie was calculating, always calculating. Before Odd knew it, the whole school knew about Emma's condition and there was a crowd waiting with the ambulance to watch her be wheeled in. Odd and Aelita went with her, while Ulrich and Yumi went with Jeremie to the factory to figure out what happened to their Russian friend.

Odd held Emma's hand the whole way there, listening to Aelita prattle about how it was her fault, if she'd tried to focus more on the manta, this wouldn't have happened. He didn't say anything in response, but gave her a tired look, showing her that she should stop blaming herself.

"We're going to fix this," she assured him. He looked back down at Emma and felt tears slide down his face.

When they got to the hospital, a nurse made him and Aelita wait in a sitting area while Emma was assessed. Aelita went and got Odd a soda and herself a cup of soup. She sat down with him in the waiting room, the only sound in the room was the news reporter quietly reporting the weather forecast.

A doctor entered the white waiting room and looked around, spotting Aelita and Odd, he approached them. "You two are the russian girl's friends?" he asked them Aelita nodded. "She's in a coma like sleep, we think due to some sort of trauma… we can't see any brain damage or physical injuries that would suggest a physical culprit. Can I ask you some questions about her?"

Aelita agreed and she answered all of his questions, revealing Emma's severe anxiety disorder. He said she would undergo some more tests later in the day, but they could see her up until then. Odd was first in the room, resume his position of hand holder, lying down with her in bed, holding her. Aelita sat in a chair next to them.

Emma was receiving oxygen through a nasal cannula, and a nurse had changed her clothes; she wore a green hospital gown. Her hair was starting to become matted so Odd pulled her up while Aelita tied it into pigtails. They stayed with her until she was taken away out of the room. The transporter didn't seem surprised that Odd was laying in bed with Emma, and they were trying to bring light into the situation, assuring them that Emma was in good hands. They said that she could have more visitors tomorrow.

Odd and Aelita got a taxi back to Kadic, compliments of the hospital. The teo of them went straight to the manhole to go to the factory; Jeremie had texted them that he thought he knew what was going on.

When Odd and Aelita arrived in the super calculator room, Odd noticed the look of determination pressed onto everyone's faces.

"Odd, Aelita, how is she?" Yumi asked.

"What do you think?" Odd asked tersely. "She's in a coma receiving oxygen and getting a bunch of tests done."

"Jeremie founds what X.A.N.A. did. She's been trapped in her nightmares. He's bringing every anxiety she has to the surface," Ulrich informed his friends.

"What can we do to stop it?" Aelita asked.

"Well we need to get her into Lyoko again. I need to send some of you to sector five for some data, but I need someone to take her into a tower where she'll be safe. If my calculations are correct, she'll remain in the coma until I can set her free from X.A.N.A. 's trap," Jeremie explained.

"We need to bust her out of the hospital?" Odd asked, surprised. "It'll be easy," he said sarcastically.

"We've done it before… twice. When we had to get you and Ulrich," Yumi reminded him. "It might be a little tougher because she'll be deadweight…"

Odd thought about this; he knew there was no choice in the matter. Doctors would just set her up in a room and just keep her stable and hope for the best. Emma wouldn't get better unless they did this. Odd started thinking of a battle plan for their mission.

"Okay, I have an idea… but it's really risky…" Odd stated, looking his friends in the eye. "But for Emma, I'm willing to try anything."


	25. You Don't Want to Know

Jeremie wasn't very comfortable with this; he was never very comfortable when they were in the process of doing one of Odd's schemes. They were going to break Emma out of the hospital and Jeremie's only real part was driving the car, and disabling the hospital security. No big deal.

Odd and Aelita would go to work getting Emma, while Ulrich and Yumi acted as a distraction or did whatever they could to guard Aelita and Odd while they took Emma back to the car, where Jeremie would gun it when everyone was accounted for. He would take a windy path and try blending into traffic as he took them back to the factory, where they would go down to the scanners and Jeremie would disable the elevator to prevent any possible followers from interrupting them.

Piece of cake, right? Probably not. Jeremie wasn't very confident in his driving; he'd been the best during the latest practice session that the school held, but he still wasn't sure if he'd be able to get them all in and out of this mission safely.

He got them to the hospital just fine, and he watched them as they ran into the hospital. He got to work hacking into the security system and easily disabled it. Now it was up to his friends.

Odd and Aelita entered Emma's room with no problems. The only obstacle they saw was sticking out of Emma's arm; an IV. Aelita grabbed some tape and cotton from the supply cupboard and sat down next to Emma, while Odd made sure no one was coming. Yumi and Ulrich were nearby as well, monitoring the situation. Odd watched as Aelita disabled the IV machine and tore tape off of Emma's arm, pulling the needle out. She pressed the cotton onto the wound and taped it down. She threw the used IV needle into the waste can.

"Wow, Aelita, where did you learn to work an IV machine?" Odd asked her as he picked Emma up in his arms.

"There is a simple off procedure. Are you ready?" Aelita asked him, glancing out the door. She gave Ulrich a signal and he started walking toward the elevator, pressing the down button. Lucky for Odd, Emma's room wasn't far from there. Yumi started yelling at a nurse in the hallway and drew the attention of everyone there. Odd and Aelita slipped out of the room with Emma, speed walking.

"Hey!" A nurse called from down the hall. "Stop them!"

Odd ran into the elevator, followed by Yumi and Aelita. Ulrich pushed the close doors button and the doors closed them in before anyone could reach them.

"They must hate us, we're always stealing their patients," Yumi breathed and smiled. When the elevator doors opened, she left first, followed by Aelita, Odd followed with Emma, and Ulrich brought up the rear, holding off security guards.

Yumi kicked a security guard that was coming at them from in front and Aelita and Odd ran out of the hospital, toward where Jeremie was parked. The four of them ran into the car, Jeremie had the gas floored before Ulrich even managed to close the door.

A high speed chase commensed but Jeremie managed to confuse their chasers, snaking throughout traffic in the city before they reached the factory. Jeremie just barely stopped in time before the car crashed down to the floor where the elevator stood.

"Now comes the hard part," Jeremie breathed. "Fixing her! Go, go, go!"

They sprung out of the car, Odd first. He slid down the rope with Emma over his shoulder and returned her to the bridal style position. He carried her to the elevator and the five of them rode down, panting and catching their breath. Jeremie went to the calculator room and the other five went to the scanners. Jeremie scanned Odd and Emma first, in the forest sector, where Odd carried her to a tower and stood guard.

"Now, you three need to go to sector five and retrieve some data for me that will help me break X.A.N.A. hold over Emma. If you fail, We risk Emma's nightmares turning into a real health hazard for her," Jeremie told Ulrich, Yumi, and Aelita as they stepped into scanners. He virtualized them directly into the arena, where they waited for the wall to open up so they could get into the Core Zone.

"Get to the interface panel on the surface!" Jeremie directed when the wall opened up. They warriors went off; Yumi stayed back to battle a group of creepers that were trying to keep them from the elevator, while Ulrich and Aelita went on. When the two finally managed to reach the elevator, A creeper shot Ulrich once.

"You just lost 40 life points, Ulrich. Be careful!" Jeremie demanded. "Get the information we need from the interface, hopefully it doesn't take too long."

"Hey, Jeremie!" Odd called suddenly. Jeremie turned his attention to the tower and Odd. There were two megatanks and five kankrelats shooting at the tower; Odd was trying to destroy them, slow but sure. "Reload me!"

Jeremie did so, setting Odd up with twenty laser arrows. He watched as Odd jumped onto a megatank after it tried attacking Odd with a horizontal blow. "Laser arrow!" Odd shouted and sent the megatank toppling to destruction. Odd turned his attention to the Kankrelats, who were leaving the fighting to the megatanks while they fired at the tower. Odd shot at three of them and kicked one over the edge into the digital sea. The last one fired at the tower again and Odd kicked that one into the air and fired, watching it shatter.

"Jeremie, are they almost done? And what would happen if the tower keeps taking hits?" Odd asked as he watched X.A.N.A. send him a Krab.

"You don't want to know," Jeremie told him honestly. "Just keep defending it. Aelita is done finding the information and she and Ulrich are coming back there now. I'm starting the process to heal Emma."

The megatank fired a laser and Odd dodged it easily, launching itself at the creature and sending a laser arrows straight in its eye.

Before he knew it, he was on to the Krab, who didn't seem willing to stand still. Out of nowhere, Ulrich's bike crashed into the krab and Ulrich jumped on top of it and sliced through its shell, jumped down next to Odd. Aelita ran into the tower and Odd followed, while Ulrich waited outside.

Emma was lying in the center of the tower, hovering slightly. Aelita was standing over her, telling Jeremie what she observed. Odd just watched them, watched Emma particularly.

"This is going to take a few minutes… and I hate this, I can see the nightmares on my screen through the process," Jeremie said, sounding shaken. Yumi's voice came from the background, sounding just as disturbed.

"What are the nightmares?" Odd asked. Aelita looked up at him, worry in her eyes.

"Odd, I don't think I can tell you," Jeremie replied. "It's… too brutal. Ask her yourself to see if she wants anyone to know."

Odd nodded, wanting so bad to embrace Emma, to take her pain away but he knew he couldn't touch her or it would mess up the process. He left the tower to compose himself and Ulrich looked at him with concern.

"Is she going to be alright, buddy?" he asked. Odd looked up and nodded.

"Jeremie said it will take a minute."

"It's all done now, actually. I want you two to devirtualize each other," Jeremie commanded. "I'm bringing Aelita and Emma in after you two are there. Emma's going to be weak when she comes out but she'll be okay."

Ulrich and Odd nodded and took aim at each other. "1, 2, 3!" Ulrich said and they hit each other, watching the other pixelate.

In the scanner room, Ulrich and Odd stepped out of their scanners, shaking the disorientation out quickly. They went directly to Emma's scanner and waited.

Aelita came out first and joined the boys. Emma's scanner opened and she was curled up, hugging her knees, asleep at the bottom of the scanner; she looked better, calmer, than before. Odd picked her up out of the scanner and carried her to the elevator, followed by Aelita and Ulrich, who were exchanging worried glances. Odd didn't say a word.

When they went up to the lab, Emma started waking up, making groaning noises and opened her eyes. They shot open suddenly and Odd struggled not to drop her as she wriggled slightly in his arms out of panic. He knelt down and set her on the floor.

"Emma?" Odd asked and she looked at him blankly.

"What happened? I felt like I was sleeping and couldn't wake up," she said hoarsely, her voice weak.

"X.A.N.A. trapped you in your own nightmares and intensified them. If we hadn't stopped it, you could have suffered some severe brain damage from the effects of his control," Jeremie explained. "For now, the hospital it trying to find you. I'm launching a return to the past," Jeremie announced and pressed enter.


	26. Sleepovers and Girl Talk

I found myself at Kadic, this was right before Film Club was supposed to get together; right before Odd was going to perform for me. I sat down on a bench, feeling completely sick to my stomach. I remembered the nightmares, all of them, and couldn't bring myself to face any of my friends. I stood up from the bench and ran back to the dormitory building to hide in my room.

I collapsed onto the floor when I shut the door and locked it. "I can't do this," I said to myself hoarsely. I crawled over to my bed and curled up, hugging my knees to my chest, feeling as though my body weighed ten tons. I flipped myself onto my back and stared at the ceiling. Why did X.A.N.A. target me so much? Was the last attack just a coincidence, because I was the only one on Lyoko with Aelita? Am I that easy to take down?

I thought about it, going over different reasons for why X.A.N.A. wanted me gone so badly, thinking about the nightmares, thinking about my friends, thinking about Odd… My mind raced until I heard a knock at my door and forced myself to get up to unlock the door. I went back to my bed when it was unlocked and plopped back down, lying on my back once more. Odd and Aelita came in slowly, deliberately.

"How are you feeling?" Aelita asked me, I couldn't bring myself to speak. Odd sat down on the bed next to me and I looked away from him, remembering the nightmare he was in. I can't bring myself to face them, especially him. What if the dreams meant something? What if my subconscious mind was telling me something?

What if X.A.N.A. was trying to tell me what he really wanted from me? Maybe he was telling me that I was destined to kill one of my friends.  
"Do you want to come down to dinner?" Odd inquired, sounding worried and hurt. I know I stood him up, knowing what he was going to do. He probably misunderstood my deserting him.

"I don't want to go anywhere," I said quietly. "I'm not in the mood to eat or talk."

"You should talk about it," Odd tried to argue. "It might help you."

"I don't think it will help, and remembering it is hard enough, let alone talking about it," I told him. "Just go now, please. I think I'm just going to take a shower and study for the night."

"I'm leaving my cell phone with you, if you want any company at all, call one of the others, and we'll come be with you," Aelita said. "All of their numbers are programmed into my speed dial."

She and Odd left me then, Odd giving me a kiss on the cheek first. I felt a stab of guilt; I saw how much he loved me, and I hated to think it, but apparently I wanted to kill him? The worst part of that dream was how I'd smiled after killing him, like I was happy to be killing the one boy who ever showed me love.

I sat up and took a deep breath, deciding I needed a good shower. I wished that I could turn my mind off but it continued to race as I stood under the warm water. I thought about how I'd only been at Kadic for a little over a month and X.A.N.A. had already set two traps on me alone and almost drove me to suicide the first time. This time he was doing worse, making me second guess my relationships with my friends.

I left the shower room then and washed my face in the sink, brushing my teeth. I went back to my room, wearing the bathrobe I'd gotten in Italy.

I knew where I stood with Jeremie, Yumi, Ulrich, and Aelita, for the most part, but I was really confused about Odd. I decided that Yumi and Aelita would possibly be able to help me, since they'd helped me with things before. I grabbed Aelita's phone and found Yumi's speed dial number; number 3, right behind voicemail and Jeremie. I took a deep breath and pressed talk.

"Here goes nothing…" I mumbled as the phone rang.

"Hello?" Yumi's voice greeted. "Emma?"

"Yumi, I was wondering if I could come to your house tonight? I want to talk to you. Could Aelita come also?" I asked quietly. "I figure it might be alright since it is Friday… and none of us has a class tomorrow." There was some small Holiday tomorrow, nothing I knew or cared about.

"Yes, yes that sounds like a great idea. You don't want the boys to come?" she asked me, her voice lowered. I knew she was sitting with all of them, probably on the bench.

"No, I kind of want a girls' night, like we did before the holiday break?" I told her.

"Aelita will come get you. I'm going to go home now to let my parents know and make sure my brother doesn't bother us. It shouldn't be a problem," Yumi said. I heard Ulrich tell Odd to shut up in the background. "You two come over whenever you're ready. See you soon!"

She hung up then and I set Aelita's phone down on my bed, going over to my armoire. I towel dried my hair and brushed it out before changing into a clean pair of skinny jeans and a T shirt. I pulled my hoodie on just as Aelita knocked and entered my room. She smiled carefully and sat down on my bed.

"Yumi wants to know if you'd like to spend the night at her house," Aelita said. I looked at her, confused.

"I haven't been to a sleepover since I was five," I told her absently. "It sounds like fun, but only if her parents approve. Should I bring an overnight bag just in case?"

"Just bring your toothbrush and small things, she always has me wear some of her pajamas when I stay the night so I don't have to bring a lot of stuff. Don't worry about blankets or anything like that, either," Aelita told me, answering all of my questions before I could ask. I grabbed my toothbrush and shoved it into my purse and also grabbed a few other things I thought I might want to have with me, like some photographs and my journal. "And I already asked Principal Delmas, he says it's fine as long as we are back to Kadic by noon tomorrow."

I nodded and the two of us left, stopping in her room so she could get some overnight things as well. We walked in silence out of the dorm building and off of the campus. I've been to Yumi's house twice now; once to help her film a project for her history class and once just to hang out with our friends. I still couldn't believe how kind her family was to me; even Hiroki was nice, even if he enjoyed teasing Yumi and I about our relationships.

"Yumi and Ulrich, Aelita and Jeremie, and Emma and Odd… you're all dating each other!" Hiroki had teased us last time. Ulrich had been confused, Yumi had yelled at Hiroki to go away.

"So are Ulrich and Yumi dating yet, or what?" I asked Aelita as we walked through the city.

Aelita shrugged. "They pretty much are. They won't declare it official, or Yumi won't. We can ask her about it when we get there!" she said.

"Some real girl talk will do us all good, what with all that's been going on." I agreed.

* * *

**A/N: Girl talk... **


	27. Put Something Together

When we reached Yumi's house I pushed the gate open and closed it behind Aelita. We knocked on the door and Hiroki let us in, calling Yumi to attention. She rushed downstairs with her mother following suit. Her mom smiled at Aelita and I.

"Yumi asked if you two could spend the night. That will be just fine," she told us. "My husband and I welcome you with open arms, Yumi's friends are family in this house."

"Are you hungry?" Yumi asked us when her mother and Hiroki left us alone. My stomach grumbled, roaring its discontent at me skipping dinner. I nodded sheepishly and Yumi led Aelita and I into the kitchen, where she had a sushi dinner prepared already.

I've never had sushi before but it all looked really good. I sat down across from Yumi, next to Aelita, and we dug into the food. They didn't eat much, because they'd already eaten dinner, but I pigged out, more than I thought I would.

"Wow, I think you can even give Odd a run for his money right now," Aelita giggled. "You're that hungry?"

I nodded. "I skipped dinner… and I feel like I haven't eaten in days," I confessed. "Even though technically I ate a few hours ago."

"You've been through some major trauma. It's no wonder your body is being so demanding for food and rest," Yumi said, understanding.

"Does it feel this bad after every time X.A.N.A. tries to attack someone individually?" I asked.

"X.A.N.A. has done a lot of really bad things to all of us…" Yumi said slowly. She scowled at her veggie roll. "I think it affects us differently each time."

"X.A.N.A. thinks of something, and doesn't hesitate to try it," Aelita added. "He's made polymorphic spectres of all of us, trapped us in numerous places to divide and conquer to try getting rid of us. Using our subconscious fears is a new one."

"So this is just… part of the job?" I asked them, thinking of all the terrible things X.A.N.A. could do.

"We do this so that X.A.N.A. doesn't have a chance to do these terrible things to the whole world," Aelita said.

"His attacks have become more brutal," Yumi said, finishing off the last of her meal. "So we know he's getting stronger. Our goal now is to travel into the internet to try to destroy him there."

"That sounds wild," I replied, imagining the five of them, traveling through a digital… well I had no idea what the internet would resemble. It could be an indescribable environment, we might have to come up with a new word to describe it… who knows?

"Jeremie and I have spent the past few weeks developing a sort of submarine that can take us into the digital void and out of Lyoko," Aelita explained to me as I finished off the rest of my food, adoring the wasabi. I laid it on pretty thick.

"Sounds spectacular," I said, pushing my dish away. Yumi, Aelita and I stacked our plates and Yumi took them to the sink to rinse them off and then loaded them into a dish washer.

"So what shall we do now?" She asked Aelita and I.

We decided on watching a movie; not actually watching it though. We spent our time, instead, discussing, anything and everything. Aelita talked about her relationship with Jeremie, she and I interrogated Yumi about Ulrich, and then they turned on me.

"We know Odd was planning something special for you before you went into a coma," Yumi said. "What was it?"

"He sang to me, he performed two songs he found on the internet," I told them, smiling at the memory. "I don't know what they were called, the first one is hard to guess but if I had to take a guess at what the second song was called, I'd say New Horizons."

"I'll figure this out," Aelita said. She took her phone out of her bag and dialed a number. I stared, taken aback at her, and felt panic rise within me.

"You're not calling him are you?!" I asked in alarm.

"Hi, Ulrich," Aelita said, giving me a look. I shook my head, that wasn't much better! "I have a question about Odd and Emma. What are the songs called that he used for her?"

She was silent, nodding every few seconds. "Okay, so the band is called Flyleaf, and the first song was a mix of Set Apart This Dream, and Tiny Heart. The second song was New Horizons, you were right, Emma! Thanks Ulrich! What, Odd? Um, no reason, bye!" She hung up and giggled, looking at us. "Odd's wondering why we're talking about his music, he's going to be freaking out all night," she said, finding it funny.

Yumi found the band on YouTube using her phone, and paused the movie to get rid of the background noise. She played New Horizons first; I couldn't understand all of it, considering my understanding of English was minimal, but it sounded like the song Odd had done, only Odd's version was acoustic and I could understand it all…

She played the other two songs next and Aelita thought it was all really sweet. "He must have spent a long time translating them. And then creating a mash up…" she said thoughtfully. "They are very nice songs though."

"He'd told me that they expressed his emotion perfectly. I love that he did it but… When we did the return to the past, I couldn't bring myself to face him, I couldn't bring myself to listen to it again."

"Why?" Yumi asked, curiously. She played a playlist of Flyleaf songs so we could hear more of their stuff. We might not understand all of the lyrics, but it was nice to listen to.

I looked away from them, debating on whether or not to tell them. I know the reason I wanted to come tonight was to talk to them about this, but I wasn't sure how I would do that yet. Here goes nothing…

"The nightmares I had while I was under were really… fierce," I started. I explained to them the dreams I had of each of them dying. "I don't think it was in any particular order, but Odd was last. You remember when he and I were in the elevator, sitting and talking?" I asked them.

"Well you didn't talk while we were there, but you did tell us about it," Yumi replied, shakily. She couldn't believe the detail I gave her dealing with their deaths. Aelita was shaken as well, hugging a pillow.

"Well the dream started off while we were in Lyoko, fighting the tarantulas. And it continued the same way it actually happened until he told me he thought he loved me. I said, 'Odd, I love you too but,' and I stabbed him myself, and smiled. It was the worst… and then the dreams just got gorier and bloodier, and that's when I started to try waking up, but I couldn't… And all of the dreams involved fears and anxieties I have."

"That X.A.N.A. , sick bastard," Yumi hissed, punching the couch. "I'm so sorry you went through that."

"I just don't know what to do now though, I feel like Odd's probably getting sick of this…" I said sadly.

"He's in love with you," Aelita told me. "He might be a little stressed but I don't think he would go from serenading you with music he put together himself, to being sick of you. Besides, he knows more than anyone how X.A.N.A. 's attacks put a toll on us."

"I think you need to talk to him," Yumi said. You should try doing it tonight."

"I want to find a better way to express what I want… I want to show him that I know how much he's tried to help and protect me, that I appreciate it and want to tell him I want to do the same for him."

"You could try doing what he did for you, singing. I'm sure we can put something together," Aelita said.

"You could always just use some flyleaf songs, I'm sure you could find songs that would work for you. Aelita and I can translate them into French for you, and we can figure out a way to play background music for you," yumi suggested.

"I could create techno mixes to mimic the sound, and play it for you while you sing," Aelita said.

So we went to work listening to Flyleaf songs and Yumi and Aelita found three that they thought matched what I'd said that I wanted; Red Sam, Circle, and There for You. They said they would translate them all separately for me and I could pick and choose how I thought I'd like to do it. When all three songs were totally translated, I highlighted the lines I liked from Circle and Red Sam, and chose to do There for You alone.

"The only problem I have is I've never really sung much before," I told them. "Church Choir is all, but I'm out of practice. I'm afraid I'll sound terrible, this singer is amazing…" I looked at the picture of the band, seeing the woman in the middle; she was pretty too.

"The nice part of singing, most songs are pretty easy to manipulate for any type of voice," Aelita explained. "I don't sing much, but I might be able to help you with it. We'll work on it this week to figure out how to do this."

At this point it was almost 1:15 A.M., Yumi went and got some blankets and more pillows from the closet and we settled into the places we would sleep; I was on one end of the couch, Yumi was on a reclining chair, and Aelita was at the other end of the couch. Yumi turned the movie back on and we watched it. I felt myself drift to sleep.


	28. Another Sleepover

For the first time in a long time, I didn't have nightmares; I slept through the night until Yumi shook me awake at 10:30 in the morning. We ate breakfast with her family and Aelita and I left for school.

"I slept through the night, without nightmares for the first time in weeks," I told Aelita while we were walking. "I feel more rested than ever before, it's great!"

"Well you're in a fantastic mood, I can see," Aelita laughed. "I'm glad, I really am."

When we got back to Kadic we checked in with the Principal Delmas so he knew we were back on time, and then we took showers and changed into clean clothes. We met in the studio to work on the music.

"Where are Ulrich, Jeremie, and Odd?" I asked Aelita.

"Jeremie said they are at the factory, he's teaching Odd and Ulrich about our ship. I texted him earlier," Aelita replied. "Now, Yumi downloaded those songs for us and gave me a copy. I should be able to come up with a good mix for both of them and you can work on your singing while we're here," she said, hooking up the sound board and went to work. I looked at the lyrics and listened to the melody, practicing line by line.

We worked until dinner time; Aelita and I met up with Ulrich, Odd, and Jeremie. I sat down next to Odd, Aelita sat next to Jeremie, and Ulrich sat on the other side of me.

"So why did you call us last night about the songs?" Odd asked, shoveling pork into his mouth.

"Well I called Ulrich, as I recall," Aelita corrected. "And we were just curious. Emma told us the songs were great and we wanted to check out the originals."

"You thought they were great?" Odd asked me. I smiled and kissed him on the cheek in response. "That's fabulous! I worked really hard on them."

"He wouldn't shut up about them for two weeks. It's a mystery as to how he kept it a surprise," Jeremie chuckled. "He made Ulrich and I swear to secrecy, but I wasn't sure if he would follow that, himself."

"The songs were very nice, I liked them in English but I couldn't understand them very well," I told him. "I loved it in Italian."

He smiled and fought doing a fist pump. Instead of that he just kissed her. "I do love you, so much," he whispered.

"Having a moment in the cafeteria? So tacky," Sissi chortled from where she sat nearby. I turned to glare at her and she shrunk a little; she still remembered the incident in the rec room.

"You know what's tacky? Having a thing for someone who will never return your feelings," Odd retorted cruelly. Ulrich kicked him, disapprovingly.

"That's not necessary, Odd," he said. "It might be true but you don't need to bring it up."

Sissi rolled her eyes, "morons," she muttered and turned to her food.

When dinner was over, Odd took me back to his room and we watched a movie on Jeremie's laptop while Ulrich, Jeremie, and Aelita went to the factory. I felt right for some reason, like all of the turmoil from the past few weeks was just gone.

"Oh! Guess what? I forgot to tell you," I said suddenly. I twisted around from where I was situated in his arms. "I didn't have any nightmares last night!"

"Jeremie said he'd fixed it so X.A.N.A. couldn't screw with any of us during the virtualization and devirtualization processes, so hopefully there won't be any nightmares for any of us," Odd said and smiled, "I'm so glad it worked. He told me that he'd seen some of the nightmares while he was doing his thing and he said they were really disturbing."

"That's what Yumi said last night," I said and blushed. "She wouldn't tell me what she and Jeremie saw though."

"Can I ask you to tell me about them?" he asked and I shook my head instinctively. "Please? I couldn't tell you how worried I was and from the look on your face, there were some pretty bad ones…"

"Well…" I started to explain to him the nightmares, the ones where each friend dies, the rape, and all of the other ones. I left his death out, hoping he wouldn't notice.

"And what about me? Did I get killed in one of your dreams?" hee asked when I was done. I looked down at Kiwi, sleeping calmly by my side. I started petting him, trying to keep myself together. I nodded.

"I killed you myself," I whispered. "It was the worst out of all of them."

"But you know it's all in the past now? None of that could ever happen… Well, it could I guess but we always pull through, all of us. The six of us, we protect each other so shit like that can't happen. And as for you killing me, I think X.A.N.A. just really wanted to fuck with your head, so he chose the easiest way he knew how."

I looked up at him and nodded, smiling. "I know all that… Yumi and Aelita told me that last night, it's just I still remember all of them… vividly. I wish I could forget it."

"We all have things we wish we could forget. It comes with the territory. Whats worse is we'll never be able to see psychiatrists because they'd lock us up in an instant," Odd responded. "You just need to find a way to channel those feelings into a hobby or something."

"Like you channel your emotions into your music?" I asked. "And Ulrich channels his emotion through Pencak Silat and other sports… Jeremie?"

"Studies his ass off and works every day to figure out ways to get rid of X.A.N.A. ," Odd answered. "You like to write things down don't you? You could write creative stories! Or you could channel it into film and photography."

I thought about that. Writing creatively… I used to write short stories when I was little, it's how I learned Slovak and Russian; whenever I needed a new word to use, I'd look it up in the dictionary and practice writing it. I used to do that all day if I could.

"It's all so crazy," I said. "I feel like we're all way in over our heads."

"We are. But we're managing," Odd replied.

We went back to watching the movie, I found myself falling asleep in his arms. I could tell he was falling asleep as well.

I woke up with a jolt to realize I was still in Odd's room; Ulrich had returned and he was asleep in his bed, Odd was also still asleep. I looked at their alarm clock and gasped, it was 2 in the morning. I quietly gathered my things and tried getting up. I felt Odd's arms wrap around my waist to hold me hostage there.

"Just sleep here until it's time to get up. Jim is more likely to catch you if you're walking around this early," he mumbled and pulled me back down beside him. I dropped my stuff back on the floor and turned toward him, a groggy smile on my face. He smiled at me, eyes still closed. I kissed him before falling back to sleep, my lips on his. He pulled the covers back over me.


	29. Skid for Short

When I heard the alarm I woke up to see Ulrich was already up, he seemed distressed.

"Odd! Get your ass up, we have a big problem!" Ulrich exclaimed, shaking Odd. I yawned and stretched out, sitting up. Ulrich was giving me a panicked look.

"Something on fire? X.A.N.A. attack?" Odd asked, waking up.

"Morning boys dorm inspection!" Ulrich snapped. "You knew about it!"

"Oh, fuck!" Odd cursed, looking at me, "How much time do we have?" he asked, umping out of bed and getting dressed.

"None, Jim's checking Jeremie's room right now!" Ulrich replied.

I just sat there, dumbfounded. I couldn't imagine the trouble we'd be in if Jim realized I'd spent the night in their room. Of course he would get the wrong idea… Plus Kiwi was still here. Odd texted Jeremie and looked up at me.

"Plan: Jeremie is going to hold Jim in his room for as long as he can, can you take Kiwi to your room and hide out there for a while? You should be able to sneak out and run to your room without Jim noticing if Jeremie can keep him in his room!"

I nodded, grabbing Kiwi. Ulrich looked outside into the hallway and motioned me to make a run for it. I saw boys on the floor as I ran past them; they all gave me the same, knowing look, even if it was false knowledge.

"Jeremie! You clumsy little… Maybe if you left your computer every now and then you'd be more coordinated, like me!" I heard Jim shout at Jeremie. "You are going to pick all of this up and I am going to stay here and watch while you do it, so I can be sure that you… do it!"

I looked behind me to see if Odd and Ulrich were in the hall yet and saw that Jim was half way out of Jeremie's door, barking orders. He glanced out of the room and saw my back. "Hey, wait… Emma Kozlov!"

I threw Kiwi into a passing hallway and stopped, turned to face Jim, who was approaching me. I glanced down the hall to see Kiwi still running down there. I started walking forward so Jim wouldn't have a chance of seeing Kiwi. I felt every eye in the hall glued to me.

"What are you doing here on the boys floor? Girls belong on the girls floor in the morning!" hee babbled. I looked past him to see Odd flailing his textbook in the air to get my attention. He pointed to the textbook and I smiled, getting an idea.

"I'm sorry, Jim. I know I shouldn't be down here but Odd left his textbook in the library yesterday when we were studying. I just brought it back to him so he would have it for class today."

Some boys on the floor shook their heads and rolled their eyes; they knew it was a major lie. They also knew Jim would buy it. "Well, Miss. Kozlov, that's good of you to help your friend out. Next time just give it to him at breakfast or something. Girls are not allowed on this floor at this time. I'm letting you off with a warning."

I smiled and turned to go down the hallway to the stairs. I found Kiwi waiting for me at the end of the hall. I picked him back up and continued running to my room. I set Kiwi down on the floor, panting. My heart was racing, and I sat down on my bed, calming myself. "That was way, way, way too close," I told Kiwi before getting ready for the day, showering, changing, and all that good stuff.

At breakfast Odd was in a great mood, talking of the events from that morning.

"You should have seen it, she was incredible; a real star," Odd gushed about me.

"So Emma, what were you thinking, sleeping over in their room?" Aelita asked incredulously. "You know that wasn't the brightest of ideas."

"It was an accident. Odd and I were watching a movie and fell asleep. I tried to go back to my room at 2 but Odd made me stay, I guess forgetting about the inspection," I said defensively. I glared at Odd half-heartedly. "Never listening to you again."

"Anyway, we got away with it; that's all that matters!" Odd said happily. "And I forgot about the inspection, sue me."

"Anyway…" Jeremie intervened. "The ship is ready. Aelita found a good name. A Viking ship called the Skidbladnir. It always reached its destination in the legends."

"Skid for short," Odd interrupted. "I'm not even going to try pronouncing that."

"We're testing it tonight," Ulrich said. "If you two want to, that is. Jeremie wants to get everyone else's answer."

"It's Sunday, perfect day to test it out," I said. "I'd love to, I'm curious to see what it's like."

"Count me in for sure! Did anyone ask Yumi?" Odd asked. He shoved a piece of toast in his mouth; forever eating.

"I asked her last night, She says she's game. We're going to go to the factory after breakfast," Aelita told us. "This is exciting! If this works out, we'll be a step closer to defeating X.A.N.A. once and for all!"

"And we can live normal lives," I said wistfully with a smile.

"Sounds like a plan," Ulrich agreed. "Normal lives… Hopefully it will still be fun."

"We'll always have fun and we'll always be kick ass!" Odd said cheerfully before sucking his hot chocolate down and biting into a banana.

"Well once Odd stops indulging, we can go," Jeremie said. We all stared at Odd's tray; it still held two bananas and a croissant. He looked at us and shoved the rest of his banana in his mouth and proceeded to eat the last two and the croissant in fifteen seconds flat.

"It's a wonder you don't choke," I said, a look of half-hearted disgust on my face. "Or explode."

"Four. Stomachs." Ulrich rolled his eyes, getting up with the rest of us to leave. He texted Yumi and we all headed for the factory. Odd and I raced each other on our skateboards, while Ulrich, Jeremie, and Aelita followed; I won, earning a kiss, which was the prize either way.


	30. Someone Cover Me

When we got to the factory we saw Yumi was already there waiting for us. She was on the Supercomputer looking at the Skid, looking very impressed. Jeremie explained to us each of the Nav skids; Ulrich's was the strongest but had the least amount of energy, Yumi's was the weakest but was the one of the fastest, Odd's was the slowest but had the most energy. Jeremie explained what all of that meant. Mine, apparently, was also weak, like Yumi's, but it was also one of the fastest, with a fair amount of energy. I also had the most ammo. Jeremie sent us to the scanners after he finished explaining.

When Jeremie scanned us into the Fifth Sector, Odd, Yumi, Ulrich, and I followed Aelita to the hanger bay. She told us all to get onto a transporter spot; she got onto the middle spot while Odd and I got on the two to the left and Yumi and Ulrich got on the two to the right.

"Who's driving?" Odd asked.

"Me, of course," Aelita replied.

"Are you ready? Energize."

A white light engulfed each of the transporter spots and I found myself dropping down into my nav skid. I looked around seeing several controls. "Wow, this is cool," I said.

"It's like being in a space ship!" Odd said enthusiastically.

Ulrich mentioned a video game and Odd responded but I wasn't paying attention, I was looking at my controls and getting a feel for my space.

"We're all situated; Standing by, Jeremie," Aelita announced.

"Supports away," Jeremie said in response. Before I knew it, Aelita was leading us through the celestial dome and through one of the tunnels to the desert sector. We plunged into the digital sea and I felt a panic spread through my body, anxious as we left Lyoko. Once we passed through, I couldn't believe my eyes.

"Incredible," I breathed, taking in my surroundings; it was like a real live ocean, with fish and everything.

"Amazing!" Yumi said, obviously stunned as I was.

"This is pretty cool! Let's go explore!" Odd suggested.

"But we did our test, we just needed to see if the Skid can penetrate the digital sea successfully and it can!" Jeremie protested.

"We need to see how this thing travels through the internet, otherwise what's the point?" I pointed out.

"She has a point," Aelita chimed in. "We should explore."

"Okay, but please be careful. Will five minutes be enough time?" Jeremie asked. Aelita sent us forward into the digital sea.

"What does the network look like?" Jeremie asked.

"It's amazing! I'm sending you a visual," Aelita assured him.

"Wow!" Jeremie breathed.

I looked around, barely believing my eyes, it was all so incredible! It looked like an upside down city; Aelita suggested that each building acted as the network's interconnected databases.

"Guys, Jeremie's having trouble communicating with the network. He's going to go back to the school to get some software and he'll be back soon. We're not having any trouble other than that so I think we're fine," Aelita told us. She didn't sound too worried.

I saw a slight change in the hue of the atmosphere. It changed from blue to red. "Has anyone noticed the change in the light?" Yumi asked.

"You're right, that's strange," Aelita replied.

"I think I know why. Guys what's that?" I asked, referring to a creature up ahead of me.

"Emma, I see it too, but there's more than one and they don't look very friendly! I'm sending you all out," Aelita said.

"You mean, we get to fight those things?" Odd asked, sounding excited.

Just as he said it, Aelita said: "Nav Skids away," and I felt my Nav Skid being released from the Skidbladnir and saw the others being released as well. I took hold of my torpedo launcher and swerved through the sea, approaching the eel-like creature that was watching us menacingly.

"Why are all of X.A.N.A. 's monsters so ugly?" I heard Yumi ask as she and I fired at the same creature. My attack barely scraped its side, but Yumi's hit it dead on and it shattered.

"Emma! On your right!" Ulrich shouted. I looked over and saw a shark thing preparing a laser to shoot at me. I tried veering upward to evade the attack but I wasn't quick enough; the laser slammed into my nav skid head on. I felt myself spin out of control and started trying to regain control, having some trouble.

"Someone cover me, please," I said urgently. "I need to take a minute to regain control before I take that bitch out."

Odd was immediately on my tail, watching me closely. Ulrich and Yumi were flanking Aelita as she went after another creature. Once I was back in control, I went after the shark creature and managed to target and lock it into my line of fire. I sent two torpedoes at it and gritted my teeth in anticipation. A direct hit, I cheered quietly while Odd and I returned to the others.

"Did we get them all?" Odd asked.

"Emma and I took out one of them, Aelita took out one, you and Ulrich teamed up against a third one, and Emma just took out the big guy," Yumi replied. "We got them all." The light turned from red, back to its original blue.

"We have a big problem though!" Aelita announced. "Nav Skids in, we need to stay together while Jeremie fixes it."

She explained it while we locked into the skid. Yumi and Ulrich were the first to lock in, I was third, and Odd latched on last. Apparently while we were all fighting, the navigation and shield systems had shut down, so if we had gotten separated, it could have been major bad news.

"Where is he? How long does it take to grab some disks?" Ulrich asked impatiently.

"He should be back any minute," Aelita assured him. "But for now we need to stay where we are and remain calm."

"So are we ever going to see the light of day?" Odd asked after a few minutes of waiting around.

"Because that's the calm thing to say in this situation," I said sarcastically, feeling the anxiety building.

"Jeremie will help us out of this, I'm sure," Aelita replied.

"What's that?" Ulrich asked. He was referring to a large, dark sphere in front of him.

"Let's take a look," I replied. "Looks little like Lyoko."

"You're right, Emma! It does look like it!" Odd said enthusiastically.

"But it's not," Aelita said, worried. "It's not Lyoko. Hold on!" She didn't waste time putting on the retro break and then pulling us away from the sphere. We found ourselves lingering once again through the world network.

"Okay guys, I'm back and I'm going to start debugging everything. Hold on a minute," Jeremie said, returning to his seat in the lab.

"Ready to come home?" He asked after a minute. "What'd you do while I was gone?" he asked.

"Fought some of X.A.N.A.'s fishy minions," I said.

"What?" Jeremie asked, surprised. "What was it like?"

"There were these eels… and a shark that Emma pulverized!" Odd announced. "Ulrich and I took out an eel, Yumi and Emma took out another one, and Aelita took out the last one."

"Well done, guys!" Jeremie said. "I'd like to get some more information on these monsters…"

"I recorded a visual while we were fighting," Aelita said to him. After another minute: "okay, the navigation systems are back online, time to go home!"

We travelled through the sea and back to Lyoko. We docked the skid and de energized onto the transporter spots. Odd held his hand out to me for a high five.

"Kicking ass and taking names," Odd exclaimed. "I'm so proud. And sorry if I freaked you out with that light of day thing."

I returned his high five and smiled. "No problem. I think I just need to learn how to stay calm. Sorry I snapped at you. One thing is still bugging me though, I wonder what that sphere was?"

Jeremie rematerialized all of us then and went gathered in the lab with Jeremie. Aelita told him everything that happened while he was gone. He seemed pretty interested in the sphere.

"It could be another virtual world like Lyoko," Jeremie said thoughtfully. "No way to know until we go check it out. But for now, the only thing I want to explore is my bed; I'm wiped out."

"You're wiped out sitting in your chair while we were fighting for our lives in the network?" Odd asked incredulously.

"Odd, there was a fire drill in progress when I got to the school. I had to scale the Dorm building to get to my room to get the software I needed," Jeremie explained, shocking everybody. Jeremie was never one for "monkeying around," as he called any form of physical exercise.

"Funny joke," Yumi laughed.

"You can be a real comedian when you want to be," Odd added. Ulrich and I just snickered. Jeremie shook his head and chuckled, giving up on trying to convince us of his heroic deeds.


	31. Exploring the City

We walked back to the school then, Ulrich and Yumi went to the gym, Jeremie went to take a nap, while Odd and I went to the studio to work on the film, and Aelita went to the music room to work on her mix for my surprise for Odd.

"I love Sundays," I said happily, I was sitting on a desk, reviewing the scenes that we did today. "No classes and I get to spend the day with you, Odd."

Odd got up from his seat on the floor and kissed me on the cheek. "We got a lot done today, let's go for a walk," he said. "I have a surprise for you."

He came with me to load the video files into a flash drive that Chardin rented to me. I put the camera away and locked up the supply room. We left the building and he led me off of the school campus, toward the woods.

"What's your surprise?" I asked him as we entered the forest.

He turned to face me, a grin plastered on his face. He reached into his bag and pulled out a box. I raised my eyebrow and then scowled when I realized what it was.

"It's from all of us," he said when he saw the look on my face. I looked down at the cell phone box and looked back up at him.

"So if we need to contact you for any reason, we can do it, no problem." He said, "And it wasn't expensive, Jeremie just added you to his family's plan, it only cost ten euros extra and the phone was free. His parents were fine with it."

I sat down on the ground and opened the box, taking the orange phone out of the casing. It was the same as Aelita's phone; a slider phone with a full keyboard for texting. From the looks of it I had a lot of basic features. I liked it a lot, but still… "I hate that you all spend your money to help me out," I said truthfully. I looked at my phone number printed on the box, wondering if they all had it already.

"This is a necessity, once we take X.A.N.A. out you can opt out of the phone if you want but for now, we need you to have it," Odd pointed out. "Plus, I'd like to be able to talk to you even when we're not together," he added.

"Well, thank you… You'll have to give me a little while to learn it; I've only used a cell phone once or twice."

"Well take your time, hopefully X.A.N.A. doesn't give us a reason to need it," Odd replied.

We move on, continuing deeper into the forest, discussing the film we were working on, gushing about how amazing the internet exploration was, and we talked about a million other things, and we saved talking about how hungry we were for last.

"Time for lunch!" Odd said, excited. "I'm taking you to get some burgers. Promise it's not expensive."

I rolled my eyes but accepted. I usually picked the cheapest meals anyway. Odd led me out of the woods in a different spot than where we came in. he led me into the city and and we walked for a while until he led to a small road, not wide enough for any cars but it was crowded with people, shopping and chatting with friends. He and I maneuvered our way through the crowd and he pulled me into a small restaurant that served people through a window outside, or inside over the counter. Odd said that the seating was upstairs if we wanted to sit in. I told him that would be nice and we looked at the menu and ordered.

I ordered a black bean veggie burger with cheese, tomato, pickle, lettuce, and onion, while Odd ordered a normal beef burger with all of the same toppings. Odd carried the tray with our food and followed me upstairs, sitting down at a table in the back corner.

"So I have a question," I started, unwrapping my burger, lifting the top bun off, and squirting on some mustard. "Has Jeremie ever been on Lyoko?"

"He tried once a few years ago so he could see Aelita face to face but ended up going to some sort of limbo between worlds," Odd replied. "He actually went to Lyoko successfully another time, but he didn't like it much."

"How come?" I asked. "Monsters get the best of him?"

"Megatanks, to be precise," He confirmed. "he says he'll never go back."

"What did he look like?"

"He wore a blue body suit with black gloves and boots and a black belt. He had on blue goggles and we don't even know what he weapon was, he was devirtualized before we could find out!" Odd snickered. "It was pretty bad."

"I can imagine… I can picture him having similar abilities as Aelita, energy fields and even creativity if that would even be possible."

We finished our burgers and kept talking over the basket of fries Odd had gotten on the side for us. Before we knew it, it was already 5 in the afternoon. "So what do you want to do now?" Odd asked when we finished our fries. He's already paid for the food so we could leave if we wanted.

"I'd like to explore the city some more, maybe," I said. "It's not often that we get to have a relaxing no-X.A.N.A. day."

"You can say that again," Odd agreed. He took my hand and we left the restaurant together, walking further down the small street, looking in at different shops and venders until we reached a larger street where we continued our window shopping and talking. We spent a few hours getting lost in the city until Odd looked at his phone and groaned.

"Oh no! We have five minutes to get back to school before the curfew! We'll never make it!"

"So we're screwed?" I asked and he grabbed my hand. We ran full speed back to the academy and stopped just before the front gates. He looked at the clock again and cringed. "We're screwed." I decided, glancing at the gate.

"Well, if we're quiet…" Odd started but a red track jacket came into view and he stopped. We stared at Jim, who was smirking at us.

"Boy, Emma, you sure seem to get yourself into trouble a lot for Mr. Della Robbia," he said to me. "May I ask where you two were?"

"We were taking a walk through the city and lost track of time," I said; it was the truth. It probably sounded lame to him though…

"I've caught you twice today doing something you weren't supposed to do! I don't want to do this but I'm going to send you both straight to the principal," Jim replied. "I think he oughta know what you've been doing!"

"We haven't done anything! We swear, Jim!" Odd said animatedly. "And its Sunday night… do you really think Principal Delmas wants to see us right now?"

"Fine, first thing tomorrow then," Jim said, taking both Odd and I by our shoulders and escorted us both through the campus. "If you fail to make it to your appointment I'll know and there will be hell to pay."

Jim dropped me off at my room and I waved goodnight to Odd as Jim followed him to the stairs to go upstairs. I sighed and closed the door, going to my desk to study for an hour or so before I actually went to bed. I heard a buzzing sound and a beep from my pocket and jumped, forgetting that I had a cell phone now. I looked at the screen, it told me I had a new message from Odd; they'd already programmed all of their numbers into the phone! Incredible.

Odd: Hey, sorry we got busted by G I Jim.

Me: It's okay, I'm sure we're in for a detention after classes tomorrow, though.

Odd: Yep, but it was worth it, right?

Me: Yes it was.

Odd: Great! :D

Me: Alright well study! Or go to bed. I'll see you tomorrow.

Odd: Goodnight! Love you 3

Me: Love you too!

I plugged my phone into the charger and plugged it into the wall. I set my books down on my desk and changed before going back to bed.


	32. Detention

I woke up at 5:30 in the morning and rushed to the shower before it got crowded and washed up for the day. When I came back to my room I changed into a a burnt orange jumper dress with a short sleeved yellow dress. I put socks and sneakers on and ran out of my room, a smile on my face the whole time. I went to the cafeteria and got my food and sat down with Jeremie and Aelita.

"Where's Odd, Ulrich, and Yumi?" I asked them.

"They should be here soon enough," Jeremie answered, taking a bite of his toast.

Ulrich and Yumi arrived then but Odd still wasn't there. "So, did Odd give you the cell phone yesterday?" Yumi asked.

I had a horrible revelation just then and jumped up. "Oh shit! I was supposed to go to the principal's office this morning! Shit, shit, shit!" I ran out of the cafeteria without another word and raced to the principal's office. The receptionist pointed me into the room and I opened the door and shut it behind me, panting. Odd was standing in front of Principal Delmas's desk, giving me a weird look. Mr. Delmas looked irritated.

"Thank you for joining us, Miss. Kozlov," he said to me.

"I'm sorry, sir. It slipped my mind that I was supposed to come this morning…" I replied. I stood beside Odd. The principal cleared his throat.

"I'm very disappointed in the two of you, Emma you've been getting into nothing but trouble since you came, it seems." The principal continued. "Odd, you're obviously not being much of a good influence. I can't separate the two of you, but I can make you think about what you're doing and how you can improve upon yourselves, I'm awarding you each 4 hours of detention in the library after classes today."

"Of course sir, we'll be there," I said when he was done.

"We will think about what we've done," Odd added and the principal dismissed us out of his office to go to our class.

"Where were you?" Odd asked before we entered the class.

"I completely forgot that we were supposed to go to the office. Jim kind of slipped it in with his babbling last night so I almost missed it completely. Sorry I almost abandoned you," I replied.

"I'm sorry for you; showing up late really put you on the shit list," Odd said as he opened the door. Mrs. Kensington stopped her lecture and glared at the two of us as we took a table in the back. She went back to talking and made a few jabs at us a few times, using Odd and I as examples when she gave examples of parts of speech usage in English. I ignored her completely, working on the packet that she assigned for homework. After class Odd and I explained why we had to see the principal, and the rest of the day went on as usual.

"So where's Yumi?" I asked at lunch, noticing that we hadn't seen her since breakfast.

"She got suckered into working with the 5th grade science field trip," Aelita replied.

"So, do you guys want to explore the network some more today?" Jeremie asked from behind his laptop screen.

"Detention," Odd and I said together. We looked at each other and I laughed. "Jinx! You owe me a soda!" I giggled.

He handed me his soda and smiled. "We'll share," I said, taking a sip and setting it back down.

"Damn, you always seem to be busy when we want to do this stuff," Jeremie speculated. "I was really hoping to check out that sphere."

"I don't choose to be a bad egg; I guess I just am," I replied with a smile. "Plus this dumbass right here made me spend the night on an inspection morning!" I added, nudging Odd with my foot. "And then got us lost in the city, making us miss curfew!"

"You loved it," he retorted with a grin. "You wanted me to make you stay and you wanted to explore the city."

"Next time, give me a heads up," Ulrich cut in, "since I'm assuming you were always planning to make her stay the night."

"So, tomorrow night, we'll skip dinner?" Jeremie suggested.

"I'm game," Ulrich said.

"But… but dinner!" Odd protested. "I can't kick ass in the Skid if I'm hungry, I'll come after I eat."

"Emma, you and I can go together once we change; we have gym tomorrow and I for one will feel gross going to Lyoko without a shower first. Jeremie we'll all meet up at 6:45," Aelita announced.

I finished my lunch first and started playing with my cell phone. I changed my background and played with different ring tones and stuff. I squealed with delight when I discovered that the phone actually had a camera.

"Most phones have cameras, it's actually pretty hard to find one that doesn't," Odd laughed when I explained my squeal.

"I feel like such a lame-o not knowing that," I said, blushing. "This is cool though, now I don't need to steal your camera when I want to work on my photography!"

"You're still going to want my camera for actual projects; phone cameras aren't very nice for quality," Odd responded. "You basically just use a phone camera if something funny is going on and you want to record it."

I continued playing with my phone until it was time for our next class. Mrs. Hertz bored the crap out of everyone about physics; the only one who seemed genuinely interested was Jeremie, as usual. I took down notes and started on the homework early, to Mrs. Hertz's complete and utter disapproval.

"You come to class to listen! Homework is to be done during your free time!" she'd lectured.

I went to the last two classes of the day and met with Odd in front of the library, where Ulrich and Jeremie offered to join us; they wanted to do some studying and they figured that Jim couldn't say no.

Apparently Jim decided that he could say no because he sent Jeremie and Ulrich to another part of the library and secluded Odd and I at separate tables and fell asleep within the first five minutes of watching us.

"Nap time," I said, settling my head down on my arms and closing my eyes. Odd promptly started to throw paper balls at me to get my attention. I looked up at him and he pointed to the paper wad in front of me and motioned for me to open it up. It was just a 3-D word art of the word 'Hi!' with a graphic drawing of a heart below it. I smiled and made a heart with my hands before pocketing the drawing and falling back into a sleeping position. I really was tired; I've never had that much energy to offer each day and I tried sleeping as often as I could.

I actually managed to fall asleep, having a dream about Lyoko. I was fighting a group of Kankrelats with Yumi and Ulrich. They were both having little luck with the small beasts and got devirtualized. I wasn't really sure why we were even in the forest sector anyway… there wasn't any tower in sight. There was a Kankrelat in front of me and one in back. I waited a minute, waiting for them both to charge a laser and jumped out of the way at the last second, watching them hit each other and shatter. I cheered inside my dream and looked around to see if there was anything else around to fight.

I climbed up a tree to get a better view of the sector and saw the Scyphozoa was nearby and it had Aelita.

"I didn't even know she was here," I muttered in my dream, launching myself up off of the tree and toward the Scyphozoa, hand out in front of me I fired at the tentacles and it released Aelita.

She fell to the ground and I looked at her, waiting for her to get up. I shot a few more blows at the Scyphozoa and it slinked back, retreating from the sector to wherever it goes to when it's done… Aelita got up then and looked at me strangely. My eyes widened as I saw the eye of X.A.N.A. replaced her pupils.

"Energy Field!" She shouted and fired it at me. When it hit me I jolted awake.

"Something wrong?" Odd asked from the next table over in the library. He raised an eyebrow inquisitively.

"Weird dream," I mumbled. "How much time do we have left here?"

"You were only asleep fifteen minutes. We have a lot of time to kill," Odd replied, doodling on a piece of paper.

"Oh," I sighed, leaning back in my seat. "Has Aelita ever attacked any of you on Lyoko?"

He seemed interested, "Loads of times, if X.A.N.A. possesses her through the Scyphozoa. Why?"

"She just attacked me in my dream. Now that you say that I do remember Yumi telling me about all of your X.A.N.A.-fications and polymorphic spectre episodes within the group… it's freaky."

"Yeah it is," Odd agreed, frowning. "One time she was possessed and I had to attack her directly. This was before she could be devirtualized like us, this was when Jeremie had to use a program to bring her in. I had to attack her because X.A.N.A. wanted her memory and he didn't want me to kill her. He possessed her with a necklace."

"Wild," I breathed. "Messed up…"

"Yeah, X.A.N.A. will try anything to win," Odd said, ending the conversation.

I put my head back down, not sleeping, just thinking about things. Two months ago I got my acceptance letter and my scholarship notice in the mail in Russia. My father had decided that we would leave the next day to go to Slovakia to visit relatives for a few weeks before we made our way to France. Right when I came to Kadic I made amazing friends and a terrible enemy. I thought about how funny life was, how strange it was. I glanced over at Odd who busied himself by drawing; from what I could see, it was a detailed sketch of Jim sleeping. I thought about how we'd met and connected romantically almost immediately.

I was lucky when it came to love, he's the first person I've ever even had a crush on, and I was dating him. He loved me just as much as I loved him… In the hallways and cafeteria of the school I heard some horror stories of broken hearts and I was thankful every day that I've never had one. Sure I've been through heart-wrenching experiences, but my heart never broke, not once… I wasn't sure if that made me a strong person or not.

I thought of Ulrich and Yumi, did they break each other's hearts? Why wouldn't they just accept each other as a lover and be done with it? It seemed a lot more complicated than it needed to be… Ulrich seemed to be totally ready to go out with Yumi, but she seemed to be confused and unsure… Even when Aelita and I asked her about it, she wasn't sure.

I rolled my eyes, thinking about how horrible it would be to have conflictions about romantic emotions. I smiled, thinking about how lucky I was, how glad I was to be here.

Odd caught my smile and looked right at me, "what are you thinking about?" he asked, glancing at Jim to make sure he was still sleeping.

"I'm thinking about how lucky I am, for so many different reasons," I replied.

"Like how?"

"Life, love," I listed. "Two months ago I was struggling to help my father keep an apartment together, and now I'm here, in love and getting the education I desperately worked for."

Odd smiled, "I love that about you; we're sitting in detention because we were breaking rules and you're still thinking positive."

At that moment Jim woke up noisily and Odd and I jumped, not expecting it. Jim looked right at me and outstretched his hand, I saw X.A.N.A.'s eye inside of his own too late and felt the shock of electricity pulse through my body as I was pushed out of my seat, into the wall behind me.


	33. Blood Loss

Jeremie and Ulrich heard the commotion and raced out of the room where they were studying. I got up from the floor, woozy but okay. "Shit, that hurt," I cursed. I glared at Jim and went on the offensive. He was going to block the exit. I kicked him out of the way and sat on his arms, clamping him down to the floor. "Guys, get to the factory," I hollered.

"I'll stay here and help her," Ulrich announced to the other boys. "Call Yumi and Aelita!"

"But…" Odd tried protesting.

"Go!" I yelled as Jim knocked my hand away and grabbed my wrist. I heard Odd and Jeremie run out as I was shocked again.

Ulrich came to my rescue by bashing a chair into Jim's head and he grabbed me and put himself between me and the X.A.N.A.-fied gym teacher. Jim responded by sending a pulse of yellow energy at Ulrich that knocked him out.

"Protecting people when he can't even protect himself, Ulrich Stern, everybody!" I sneered and took a defensive position. I ducked under a table and pushed it up on its side, looking up at Jim, who was approaching slowly, growling like any normal X.A.N.A.-fied person would.

"Jim, you should really expand your vocabulary," I said to him as I threw a textbook at him. I ran over to a bookshelf and proceeded to send book after book flying at him to keep his distracted as Ulrich started waking up.

"Emma!" he shouted, jumping to his feet.

"Have a nice nap?" I asked him sarcastically. Jim, fighting off each book I threw at him, approached me, grabbing me by my shirt, threw me at the bookshelf that I'd cleared off, knocking it over and ripping my shirt in the process. I felt shelves crack beneath my weight, shards of wood digging into my back and my side. I groaned, rolling off of the book shelf, grabbing a loose but not cracked shelf and shielded myself from Jim's next bolt of electricity; The wood protected me well enough. I bashed it over his head and ran to join Ulrich on the other side of the room.

"We can't stay in here. I'm sure the others got to the factory just fine. Let's go!" He said, grabbing my arm, rushing me out of the library, where a small group of students was curiously gathered. When they saw our condition they approached us, asking millions of questions.

"Guys you need to get out of here," I told them, discarding their questions. "Jim's gone bananas."

"You have wood sticking out of your back," Milly Solovieff pointed out. "And what did you say about Jim?"

Jim bursted through the front entrence of the library then, roaring his displeasure. Ulrich grabbed my arm again, pushing through students as we ran to get away from him. "We'll split up, that way one of us will reach the factory to help on Lyoko if we need to," I suggested and he nodded, veering off toward the park while I headed off to the boiler room.

Unknown to me at the time, the janitor was in the boiler room. I assumed he was doing work on the boiler or something. I cursed under my breath and tried leaving before he noticed me.

"Emma Kozlov, is that it?" he asked before I could escape.

I turned on my heel and waved to him. "Hello sir, I'm sorry to disturb you I was just looking for someone. Bye now!"

"Hold it." The door nearly smashed my hand as it slammed closed, locking me in the room. I looked back at the janitor to see X.A.N.A. 's eye gleaming in his. He smirked at me and pointed a pitch fork at me. What the fuck did a janitor at a boarding school need a pitch fork for?! Weren't those things used on farms?!

I ducked out of the way as the thing came flying at me. It barely snagged a few hairs on my head. I looked up at the tool and grabbed it by the handle, pulling it out of the door behind me and wielding it as a weapon to defend myself. With my free hand I tried to open the door, no luck.

Mr. Reilley and I stared each other down, when suddenly he came at me, hands charging electricity. I dropped down and summersaulted behind him, finding the door that would lead me to freedom. I just barely managed to get through the door when I felt an intense shock in the small of my back and Mr. Reilley pressing his hand against a piece of wood I still had sticking out of my back. I screamed and fell to my knees in the doorway, passing out from the severe pain and probably from some blood loss.

Just as that happened, Ulrich was grabbing me, situating me on his back as he skateboarded shakily the rest of the way to the factory. Amazing timing in the sewers, to say the least.

When we arrived at the end of the sewer. Ulrich called Jeremie. "Jeremie, we have a problem. Emma is in bad shape and Mr. Reilley is X.A.N.A.-fied too. We have both of them chasing after us in the sewer now. How are they doing with the tower?!"

After a moment of waiting Ulrich hung up, gritting his teeth.

"Let's go," I said quietly, grabbing onto the lowest step on the ladder up to the bridge. I pulled myself up and cringed at the pain. Ulrich took a look at my back and I felt a sharp pain as he pulled the piece of wood out and pressed his hand to the wound. I cursed inwardly as I started to ascend up the ladder. I barely made it to the top before Jim and Mr. Reilley were upon us. Ulrich rushed up the ladder and closed the opening on the bridge. He set me up on his back again and ran down the bridge, scaling down the rope, and slamming his hand on the red button to call the elevator. He set me down and ran back out before I could protest. The doors closed and I descended to the lab where Jeremie was monitoring Lyoko.

The doors opened again and Jeremie looked over at me with Yumi by his side. "Holy shit," he exclaimed and Yumi looked over and immediately ran over.

"Ulrich is still fighting Mr. Reilley and Jim," I said quietly, crawling out of the elevator and collapsing. "How are things going on Lyoko?" I asked Jeremie as Yumi left the lab to help Ulrich.

"Odd's almost out of life points but Aelita just entered the tower. I'm bringing him home and setting a return to the past," he informed me quickly. "Hang in there, Emma."

I could barely hear him. I could tell I was still oozing blood from the open wounds on my back. My ripped shirt was bloody and I could feel the blood gushing into a pool around my torso. I closed my eyes, willing the pain away and got my wish, passing out into a dreamless sleep.


	34. Return to the Past

When I woke up I was still bloody and disgusting. I had a new shirt on and I could feel that the wounds had been treated. I was lying down in a corner of the computer lab. Odd was sitting with me.

"No return to the past?" I asked, my voice raspy.

"It won't work. The tower is deactivated and Jim and Mr. Reilley are confused as hell but back to normal. Luckily Ulrich and Yumi got them back on school grounds before they woke up… Jim's in a shit load of trouble for attacking students and everyone is wondering where you and Ulrich are," Odd explained. "Jeremie's trying to debug the return to the past program, but it's taking a while. How are you feeling?"

"Like I lost a shit ton of blood," I replied.

He pointed behind him, "it's all over there."

I could see the red stains and felt sick to my stomach. "Gross. Sorry I made such a mess."

"Don't be sorry about that. It's stupid to be sorry about something that was out of your control," Odd retorted. "I was really worried. Next time, you're going to the factory while I hold the attack off."

"It went fine until he threw me at a book case," I defended. "And until I walked into Mr. Reilley…"

"You kicked ass when you weren't bleeding and passed out," Ulrich assured me from the other side of the lab.

"See?" I waved my hands in Ulrich's direction. "I'm awesome. No harm, no foul."

"Yeah, just as long as Jeremie fixes the return to the past because the school is going absolutely insane," Yumi said, coming up from the super computer room. She approached Jeremie at the computer and looked over his shoulder. "No damage to the computer, I checked everything you told me to."

"I think I've just about debugged it," Jeremie assured us. A minute later, he fist pumped his victory. "Alright! Got it! Return to the past… now!"

He clicked a few more keys and the blinding white light erupted froom the computer and engulfed the room. The next thing I knew, Odd and I were being led into the library to serve our detention.

"This blows," Odd muttered. "We have to do this for another four hours?"

"for everyone else this is a good thing," I replied quietly. "Aelita is working on some new mixes, Jeremiee and Ulrich have more time to study, and Yumi… well I don't remember what she was doing but she has more time to do that."

So we served our detention all over again, except this time Odd and I managed to sit closer to each other so we passed a piece of paper back and forth, drawing something; The game was that one person added one new detail to a drawing and passed it to the next person. By the end of detention, we had a detailed picture of a mountain. His parts looked much better than mine, except you couldn't really tell because he always tried to compliment what I did the best he could. There were small notes written in the margins, his writing in purple and mine in orange.

When detention ended he and Ulrich went back to their room to play a video game while I joined Aelita in the studio to see how she was doing with the song mixes.

"Excellent!" She announced to me. "We're all ready to start syncing your singing, practicing. I think with any luck you can perform it to him this week."

So we worked on the two songs until dinner, and then went back to working on them until we were kicked out of the studio arts building.

"So Yumi says she's going to have the house to herself for this weekend, even Hiroki is going to be gone! She said her parents are cool with us going to hang out there as long as we clean up whatever messes we make and all that. Sound fun?" Aelita asked.

"It sounds like a lot of fun, but I already told Odd we'd spend the whole weekend working on our film, we're way behind and Chardin is not a happy camper," I replied sadly.

"Bring Odd with you and rent the camera! We can all work on it. What's the film anyway?"

"It's a documentary, actually. It's boring… Chardin told us that he thinks that students don't appreciate the subtle art of the documentary so he's making us do one. We've chosen to cover the lifestyle of the average Kadic teenager."

"Perfect! This can be your weekend lifestyle! You can interview all of us and film some of our having fun!" Aelita suggested. "It will work out."

I thought about that and laughed. "We need to watch how we say things then. We all swear a lot except for you and Jeremie."

She laughed. "Yep!" When we reached my room we said our goodnights and I let myself in, expecting to change and go straight to sleep, considering how tired I was, but instead I ended up doing a pile of homework that I'd forgotten about. I didn't end up getting to sleep until near midnight.


	35. Stay on Guard

The next day went by smoothly, I got up and showered, downed some coffee to replace the energy that sleep should usually supply, and went to all of my classes on time and actually stayed awake in all of them. During lunch I got a letter from home and felt my spirits soar even higher after reading it.

After classes were over, Aelita and I changed out of our gross gym clothes and showered before getting a quick dinner with Odd and going to the factory. When we got there, we saw that Ulrich and Yumi had eaten some take out in the lab with Jeremie, waiting for us.

"We're ready to explore the uncharted territory of the network!" I said excitedly. "Today was a great day, maybe this mission will go the same way!"

"Let's hope so," Jeremie chuckled. "You're in a good mood."

"I got a letter from home earlier, my dad's doing pretty well and so is the rest of my family. It's a good sign that things are looking up," I explained.

Aelita, Odd, Ulrich, Yumi, and I went to the scanners and started the virtualization process into sector five, where we headed into the Skid garage. We energized into our spots and Jeremie and Aelita worked together to start our journey.

"I'm entering the coordinates of the sphere you guys saw on your last trip," Jeremie told us as we entered the digital sea.

"So do you know what this world will look like, Jeremie?" Ulrich asked as we travelled through the sea.

"Your guess is as good as mine," Jeremie replied. "Keep on guard for the Kongres and the Sharks. We don't know if X.A.N.A. will be guarding the sphere."

"He is!" Odd announced after a moment. "Aelita, release us!"

"Nav Skids away," Aelita said and I felt my skid disconnect from the skid and I looked around to see where the threat was. I found it; two sharks and a shit ton of Kongres.

"Why are there so many this time?" I gritted my teeth, trying to lock a kongre into my line of fire while another tried putting me in its line of fire.

"X.A.N.A. hates it when we're bored," Ulrich replied, taking out one of the sharks after his first shot missed.

"How considerate of him," I heard Odd say, I rolled my eyes and went back to the kongre in front of me. I fired and veered up just as the one in back of me took a shot at me. I spun behind it and took a quick shot, missing it. An attack from Aelita caught it off guard. I saluted at her and she smiled back before jetting off to take out another monster.

I felt my nav skid tremble as an attack hit me dead on. I steadied my vehicle and looked to see two kongres coming at me with another round of lasers.

"Oh no you don't," Odd said from nowhere, sending one of the kongres to oblivion. "Emma quit hogging the fun!"

"I'm trying not to!" I assured him. "Guess I'm too popular for my own good." I took aim at the other kongre and fired, barely hitting it.

"Ulrich's been cornered," Yumi said out of nowhere. "Hurry up!"

Odd and I found Ulrich on our screens and took off. Yumi, Aelita, Odd, and I each targeted one monster and fired all at once, surprisingly it worked and Aelita called all of the nav skids in and we finished our journey to the sphere. I waited a few seconds before the door opened up and we passed through.

"It's a world modeled after Lyoko! But it's only one sector – the forest!" Jeremie told us upon entering. I looked around to see an exact copy of the forest. I couldn't believe it.

"This is too weird," I stated as we found a tower to dock onto. We disembarked and walked around on the platform. "So what's our plan?" I asked after a minute.

"Three of us go explore and two of us stay to guard the skid," Aelita said. "I'll stay to guard the skid."

"Emma, Ulrich, and I will go explore. Odd, you can stay with Aelita," Yumi suggested. The Overmorph, Overbike, and Overwing appeared in front of us and we jumped onto our respective vehicles.

"See you later," I waved as I turned the jets on and flew up into the air next to Yumi. Ulrich stayed on the path as the three of us took off to explore.

"So how's the songs going?" Yumi asked me when we were out of earshot of Odd and Aelita. "Any luck?"

"Tons, We're almost done actually," I told her.

"Songs?" Ulrich asked. "Don't tell me you're doing what Odd did for you?"

I filled him in, figuring he wouldn't go and tell Odd. "The songs aren't as accurate at the moment… but they're still how I feel and I think he'll really like it. I hope he does…"

"Of course he will!" Yumi exclaimed. "He loves anything you do."

Right then, a laser from afar knocked Yumi off of her vehicle, toward the digital sea. I changed direction and headed right for her, grabbing her just in time, morphing my vehicle to mimic Odd's overboard I pulled her on and returned to Ulrich, who had located the attack: Kankrelats.

"Little bastards! Jeremie, thanks for warning us!" Yumi called out to the genius boy.

"Oops, I didn't see them on my radar… Sorry about that! There's ten of them… Odd and Aelita have their hands full too with three bloks and a krab." Jeremie sounded alarmed. "X.A.N.A. is attacking the skid. He's just trying to keep you guys busy away from it. If you can, get over there!"

"We will when we get rid of these little roaches," Ulrich assured as he sliced through two Kankrelats and got hit by another one. Yumi took that one out but left herself open to get hit by another one. I hung back, waiting for an opportunity to attack without getting hit myself.

"There's too many of these things!" Yumi shouted. "Hit one of them and end up getting hit by another one…"

"Stay on guard," Ulrich suggested.

"No shit," Yumi replied tersely but still got devirtualized by two surprise attacks.

"Didn't stay on guard," Ulrich mused, taking down the two that hit her but the same fate reached him as the last two Kankrelats hit him.

"Neither did you, Ulrich," I said, pouncing into action. "Made my life easier though…"

I leapt between the two Roachsters and waited while they both charged attacks at me. I jumped at the right moment and they took each other out. I grinned; just like my dream! I gasped in horror when I realized that. It's just like my dream.

"Emma! Odd's been devirtualized too, and -," Jeremie started hollering as I climbed up a tree to get a better look at the sector.

"I see it, Jeremie. What should I do?"

"Devirtualize her, I think X.A.N.A. is going to try to make her throw herself into the sea! Or attack the skid, both would be very bad."

I launched into action, landing on my Overmorph that was still mimicking the Overboard, I took off for Aelita and the Scyphozoa.

I took aim at the Scyphozoa and fired, breaking its hold on Aelita. Before she could get up I took aim and fired at her with both hands, jumping off of the Overmorph. She devirtualized and I was left alone with two annoyed Bloks.

I jumped on one of them and pressed my hand into its eye, firing and jumping off. The second blok shot two fire rings at me and I jumped through one of them, right into the other one. I fell to the ground, rolling out into a kneeling position, pointing and firing at the Blok, hitting it dead on.

"Not as much fun as Tarantulas, but still fun to fight," I said out loud. I stood up and looked around. I noticed the Scyphozoa was still there, lurking in a corner of the platform.

"Jeremie, how am I going to get out of here?" I asked. "Am I just screwed or what?"

"You can pilot the skid home, you should be fine…" Jeremie told me. I wasn't totally sure if he actually believed that but I embarked onto the Skid anyway, taking Aelita's spot. He guided me through the procedure and I managed to leave the Forest Sector Copy relatively unscathed. As I ventured through the digital sea, though, I noticed the change in the light and cursed uncontrollably as I saw two sharks swimming at me. I was so close to home free, too!

"Goddamnit!" I shouted, grabbing at my torpedo launcher.

"Emma, you can do this!" I heard Aelita say.

"Kick ass, Emma!" Yumi encouraged.

"Don't die!" Ulrich ordered.

"I second all of those, especially Ulrich's!" Odd said, louder than all the others.

I blocked them all out, trying to focus on the sharks. Because I was piloting a bigger ship, it was harder to maneuver the craft to avoid attacks, but in the end I finally did end up destroying both of them and getting back to Lyoko. I had to fight to keep myself from kissing the ground on my transporter spot in the Skid hanger room.

When I returned to the scanner room, I felt totally drained. I joined the others upstairs and sat down against the wall. Odd joined me, making sure I was emotionally intact.

"So the Replika, as I'm calling it, it's run by another super computer somewhere in the world. That means that the super computer in question, is also infected with X.A.N.A. ," Jeremie started to explain. "I'm afraid that there are more replikas out there. I am going to develop a program that can track the network for traces of X.A.N.A. . I also want to find a way for me to materialize you from a replika to the real world. It's not going to be easy…"

"We'll figure it out," Ulrich assured him. "I think we've had enough adventure for one day… especially Emma."

"At least now I know just how awesome I am," I stated, getting a laugh out of Aelita and Odd.

"You sure saved me today," Aelita said to me. "Thanks. I'm really glad you joined us."

"I'm glad too," Odd said, wrapping one arm around my waist. I blushed and put my head on his shoulder.

"We should get back… we don't need Jim catching any of us breaking curfew," Ulrich told us, calling the elevator.

"No, no we do not," I sighed. "Definitely don't need any more detention this week."

"I'm going to work on the new programs… I'll let you know when we can go back to the replika. Hopefully X.A.N.A. leaves us alone for the rest of the week," Jeremie said as we started piling into the elevator.

On the bridge, Yumi and Aelita asked me when I wanted to go through with the plan while Odd, Ulrich, and Jeremie were walking ahead of us discussing some video game.

"I think I want to do it tomorrow, actually. I feel like I'm ready. Aelita you said you saved the tracks you made on a disk so I can just play them while I perform. I'm pretty confident that it will go well," I told them with a smile. I couldn't wait to see the look on his face when I did it…

"You memorized the lyrics?" Yumi asked.

"Please… I've done a lot of staring at them since you two wrote them up," I told her. "I could recite the lyrics in my sleep," I assured her. "Of course I'm going to practice singing them a few times tonight. I was going to ask Jeremie to lend me his laptop for tonight, just tell him I'd like it to work on a project."

So I did that, I got Jeremie's laptop and then Aelita gave me the disk she saved the songs on. When I was situated in my room alone, I carefully handled Jeremie's laptop, opening the two separate song files that Aelita named "Red Circle," and "There For You." She had two versions of each song; one with the lyrics and one without. I sang along to the one with the lyrics first and then practiced without lyrics.

I played the first one first a few times, practicing while reading the lyrics in front of me. I worked on the second song for a little while longer before I was finally satisfied and went to sleep, dreaming the lyrics that still flowed through my head.


	36. True Passion

In the morning, I got ready as usual and met the warriors in the cafeteria for breakfast, handing Jeremie his laptop.

"So, Yumi's house this weekend?" Odd asked me. I smiled sheepishly and nodded. I hadn't talked to him about it yet, oops.

"They are going to help us with our documentary," I told him as he took his seat next to me. He dipped his croissant in his hot chocolate and shoved almost the whole thing into his mouth. "I think it will work, we can cover the lives of students outside of Kadic on weekends. Chardin will love it." I finished, taking a bite out of my own croissant.

"Sounds fun," he replied. "Guess it's a party then, all six of us are going to be hanging out there. She's even letting all of us stay the night just as long as we don't trash the living room."

I raised an eyebrow. Aelita hadn't mentioned that they would all be there. Guess the plans were still being developed. "Anyone else coming?" I asked.

"We asked a few other people but we want to make sure Sissi doesn't find out," Ulrich responded. "That would be a nightmare."

"Well hopefully it turns out well," I replied. I turned my attention back to Odd. "So Odd, let's work on the film in the studio after classes today, sound good?"

He shrugged, finishing off his croissant and moving onto his first banana. "Sounds good to me! I'll meet you there after I take Kiwi for a quick walk."

Classes were terrible, there was a test that I forgot about, I totally screwed up a science lab, and in my final class I tripped and face planted into the ground on my way t my seat. I had a coffee by the vending machines to calm my nerves. Aelita and Yumi joined me and tried helping me calm down.

"Maybe the bad luck I had today is a sign that I shouldn't attempt this today," I wondered.

"No! all that shit you say happened was just an unfortunate series of events. You're just psyching yourself out," Yumi assured. "When you should be psyching yourself up!"

"You're right," I breathed. I took the last swig of my coffee and tossed the cup in the trash. "I've been working on this pretty hard, it will go just fine."

"And now's your time, he's coming out of the dorm building now," Aelita said, watching the building. "He just dropped Kiwi off in his room. Go!"

I jumped up from my spot, squatting on the wall. The studio was not far but I still ran. I set things up quickly in the music room and saw a thumbs up from Aelita through the window and started the music, making sure the volume was up almost full. I took my place at a microphone and smiled when Odd came in. I motioned for him to sit down across from me and turned the music down so it wasn't blaring.

And I sang, I sang the first song and hoped he didn't notice. Like he did, I sang the mashup first and the single song second. When I finished and the music ended, dead silence filled the air. I looked at Odd, waiting for a response.

I got it when he pulled me onto his lap and kissed me furiously. We ended up falling out of the chair but kept it up, kissing for minutes on end before I realized that we had a small audience. I pulled away from Odd, blushing I stood up and straightened my dress out. I looked up at Mr. Chardin and the various members of the film club.

"Um, so are you guys ready to work on the documentary?" Odd asked, getting up as well.

"True passion at such a young age," Chardin speculated, smiling at the two of us. "That makes for truly beautiful art!"

Odd and I laughed at that as we went with the group back to the meeting room. He held my hand the rest of the day.

The rest of the week actually went by smoothly. There were plenty of Sissi attacks but those are easy to handle. No sign of X.A.N.A. though. When Friday rolled around, Jeremie made an announcement at lunch.

"I think I've figured out the materialization from the Replika," he told us. "So Sunday we can go try it out."

"We're going to have the best weekend ever!" Odd said happily. "You'll see, it'll be a blast! Especially if X.A.N.A. doesn't crash the party."

"It would be too kind of him to leave us alone," Ulrich muttered.

"He's done it before, leaving us alone on weekends. He's been quiet this week so maybe he's trying to find a way to beat us," I offered. "Because it's harder than he thought," I said proudly.

"Because we've been kicking his ass lately," Yumi added. "He hasn't thrown us a real curve ball since he put you in a coma."

"Well we'll keep it that way. Jeremie will bring his laptop to Yumi's and we'll stay on top of scans and at the slightest flicker of X.A.N.A. , we'll move in." I offered as a plan. I finished my food and stood up, "Well I am going to get to class early to review the material before the lab. I don't want to screw this one up. See you guys there!"

On my way to class I felt my phone vibrate and saw I had an incoming call from an unknown number. I answered it, wondering who would want to call me. "Hello?" I asked. "Who is this?" I felt something cold enter my body then and looked back at the screen to see the eye of X.A.N.A. . "No!" I hissed, "Get out!"

I felt a struggle inside and when the struggle ended I looked around to see people were looking at me. I blushed and took off for the woods. I didn't know why, but I really wanted to go to The Hermitage. When I got there I felt the cold thing leave my body and I could see in front of me a very big problem. A polymorphic spectre that looked exactly like me.

Sudden understanding washed over me and I backed against the door. X.A.N.A. knew he couldn't possess me long enough to make me do anything big but he knew he'd be able to control me long enough to force me to come here to trap me. This polymorphic spectre was meant to finish that job.

"Hello Emma!" it cackled as the door locked behind me. I tried opening it to get out but the spectre did something that I didn't see and knocked me out cold. The last thing I heard was my voice telling X.A.N.A. that the mission was under way.


	37. Find Her

When Odd, Jeremie, and Ulrich got to class they saw Emma sitting in the front row, reading a handout that Mrs. Hertz handed out as students entered the room. Odd took his seat next to Emma, Jeremie sat with Ulrich and Aelita sat at a table alone.

"So what's the lab?" Odd asked Emma, looking over the paper with little, almost no interest.

"We're going to dissect a rat and take a sample of blood for cultures that we'll check Monday," she replied without looking at him. "And we're supposed to take out its organs and tape them down to a piece of paper and label them."

"Sounds gross," Ulrich said from behind them.

"It's science," Emma replied simply. "And you of all people should enjoy this, you cut into creatures all the time on Lyoko."

"They are virtual, no blood involved," Ulrich responded. "Big difference."

"Just imagine this is virtual too," Odd suggested.

"It won't be bad, this actually looks like an easy lab," Aelita said. "I don't feel so bad about working alone now!"

"Easy for you to say, Princess, you have a solid A+ in this class," Odd replied. "I need a good grade on this."

"Don't worry Odd, I'll do it all," Emma offered, giving Odd a look as she went to the front lab table to get the supplies. Odd joined her and grabbed the petri dishes and the frog while Emma grabbed the scalpel and swabs.

Emma set everything up quickly, her eyes gleaming as she restrained the dead frog and began cutting into its soft underbelly. Odd watched in awe as she did every step of the lab without double checking the procedure once. When she was done the frog had all of its innards taken out and she scribbled down the names while Odd called the teacher over.

"You can't be done already!" Mrs. Hertz protested. Her jaw dropped when she saw the work was all done.

"Yeah," Odd said, kind of shocked too. "She memorized everything before class, I guess. Emma did pretty much everything… I would have helped but she was just way ahead of me."

Jeremie, Aelita, and Ulrich were watching them as Mrs. Hertz checked everything over. "Well, Miss. Kozlov, this is a very nice job! I'll give you both an A for today… next time let Mr. Della Robbia do some work as well," she said when she was done. "Class, come see Emma and Odd's lab if you get stuck."

"That was pretty cool, how you handled the lab," Odd said to Emma when Mrs. Hertz walked away to monitor the rest of the class. "Didn't know you were so good with knives."

"It's hard not to be good with them," Emma replied calmly, looking down at her work.

Odd shrugged, thinking nothing of it. He turned around to see Jeremie and Ulrich's project. Ulrich was doing the dissecting while Jeremie told him what to do. It was a lot messier than Emma's work, but it was going pretty well. Odd looked to see that Aelita was having no trouble on her own. He sighed, putting his head down on the empty space on his lab table. He wondered what he would do for the remainder of the class; there was nothing left to do.

"We need to clean up," Emma said suddenly and Odd jumped up, glad to be doing something. He took the bloody scalpel from Emma and went to clean it off while Emma took care of the bloody paper and petri dishes. Odd wiped the table down and washed his hands of the blood that had clung to his skin while he cleaned. He grimaced as he washed it from his hands; blood was never his favorite thing to see.

When he returned to his seat Emma was reading a book, obviously not interested in talking. Odd decided to doodle for the rest of class.

Classes ended and the next class went by as slowly as the last. When classes finally ended Odd felt a wave of eager excitement wash over him. Time to party!

He, Jeremie, and Ulrich were all at hanging around on the bench waiting for the girls to be ready to go when Jeremie cursed, looking at his laptop.

"X.A.N.A. activated a tower! A few hours ago too… at the end of lunch. I wonder why the scan didn't pick it up?" He wondered, typing furiously.

"No!" Odd whined, devastated. "Right before a party? How rude!"

"We need to go check it out. Maybe if we take care of this quickly we can still get to Yumi's," Jeremie said hopefully. "Call Emma and have her meet us there."

"No need, I'm here," Emma said from behind the boys. "Aelita is still uo in her room getting ready."

"Okay. Someone call her and tell her to meet us. Let's get to the factory," Jeremie said and they took off for the park. Ulrich called Aelita and Yumi to let them know what was going on. Yumi stayed home because other friends were also coming over and she didn't want to ditch them. When everyone else got to the factory Jeremie virtualized Odd, Ulrich, and Aelita first.

"Ready Emma?" Jeremie asked when a scanner opened up.

"All set, I'm in the scanner," Emma's voice called up to Jeremie. He proceeded with her virtualization. An error message pupped up in her virtualization and Jeremie clenched his fist.

"Emma!" He called. "Something happened during the transfer. Are you there?"

"Everything's okay, Jeremie, I'm on Lyoko," came her calm reply.

Odd looked around the mountain sector and scratched his head. "Where's the activated tower?"

"It… it just deactivated itself. Something's wrong, I think X.A.N.A. lured us here," Jeremie replied. Ulrich took out his katanas and everyone stood, facing different directions, standing in offensive positions.

"Why would X.A.N.A. lure us onto Lyoko?" Ulrich asked. Glancing around at other platforms to see if anything was coming.

"Hornets are coming to put on an air show," Jeremie blurted.

Odd looked around to see where the hornets were coming from. He turned just as Emma turned toward Ulrich and fired two laser bullets at him. The bullets that were usually a light orange were darker, and they were faster. Ulrich devirtualized in a flash and Odd sprung into action, putting himself between Emma and Aelita before anything could happen to her.

"Jeremie! Emma is attacking us!" Aelita shouted, activating her wings to help her evade the hornet attacks. She fired energy fields at one of them but missed.

"What?" Jeremie asked, shocked. "But... is she being controlled by X.A.N.A.?"

Emma was firing continuous shots at Odd, while Odd held his shield up. "She's obviously X.A.N.A.-fied! Why else would she attack us?"

Ulrich went up to the lab to join Jeremie then, completely confused. "Why did Emma just attack me?"

Jeremie looked at the scanner feed from Emma's virtualization and came up with the explanation. "It's not Emma, it can't be… She should be immune to X.A.N.A…. It's a Polymorphic Spectre."

"So where's the real Emma? I'll go find her," Ulrich said, heading back toward the elevator.

"I have a tracker on all of our phones, I'll find where her phone is and hopefully she's near it," Jeremie offered. Ulrich waited while Jeremie tracked down her phone. He heard Odd yelling and swearing at hornets and Aelita screaming at the Polymorphic Spectre to let her go.

"The Hermitage. Go!" Jeremie commanded and Ulrich rushed into the elevator and took off, giving Yumi a call to let her know what was going on. Meanwhile on Lyoko, Odd had managed to get rid of the hornets, while the polymorphic spectre was trying to throw Aelita into the digital sea.


	38. Bingo

"Aelita!" Odd yelled. "Jeremie what do I do?"

"Devirtualize them both! Ulrich is going to find the real Emma now," Jeremie informed him. Odd went to work, firing laser arrows at the two girls. He managed to successfully devirtualize Aelita, but now had an angry Spectre to deal with. Also, he was out of arrows.

"Jeremie, give me some arrows!" Odd demanded. The spectre did something then, calling the Overmorph to her, it appeared in front of her without Jeremie needing to virtualize it. She took off for the northern most end of the sector. "And the Overboard!" Odd added, running full speed but obviously not keeping up with her.

In the real world, Ulrich was running through the woods, trying to get to the Hermitage as fast as he could. When he got there he saw that the front door was wide open so he checked inside first.

"Emma!" he called, looking around to find any signs of her whereabouts. He walked around slowly, scanning each room. He checked in Aelita's room first, checking in the closet and everything.

He heard his phone ring and picked it up. "Jeremie I still haven't found her. How is Odd and Aelita doing on Lyoko?"

"Odd devirtualized Aelita so she's safe," Jeremie started. Ulrich started out of Aelita's room and checked the next room, which he assumed was Franz Hopper's room. "The Spectre went to Sector Five though, and she's so much faster than Odd that she's already in the Skid Hanger, attacking the Skid. Odd's going after her now."

"Keep me posted," Ulrich said and hung up. He finished checking in the room and went out into the hallway. "This is going to take forever…" he muttered.

He decided to try to call Emma's mobile, maybe it was still on, and maybe he'd be able to hear it? Ulrich barely believed it would be possible but he was nothing if not optimistic.

He listened hard any new sounds. A very faint sound came from downstairs and he ran down the steps two by two. As he ran down the steps, his foot broke through an old wooden step and his leg was scraped and peeled as it sunk into the wood. He grabbed the railing to stop it and fell back, cussing up a storm. He dropped his phone beside him as he gritted his teeth, trying to calm himself down.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck this house," he snarled as he gingerly pulled at the wood surrounding his leg to create more room for him to pull it back out. It looked pretty bad; splintering pieces of wood stuck out of his leg and blood gushed out. "The things I get myself into…" He pulled his jacket off and pulled the pieces of wood out of his leg and wrapped his jacket around the bloodied leg to stop the bleeding and tested it out; it wasn't broken but it still hurt like all hell to walk.

Ulrich slid down the rest of the steps and called Emma's phone again and listened hard. It was ringing from somewhere on the right side of the house. He stood up, wincing at the pain in his leg and limped in that direction, checking the first door, a closet with dusty clothes and no Emma. The next door was a kitchen pantry with a similar story: old cans of food and other stuff but no Emma.

When Ulrich hobbled into the kitchen he looked around and called Emma's phone again. It was loudest in here. He started opening cabinets and looking underneath the counter. The last place he looked was the refrigerator, which surprisingly was running.

Bingo.

Emma fell out, knocking Ulrich over. He cursed from the pain but also felt a wave of relief rush over him. She was freezing, but alive. She was also tied up and barely conscious.

Ulrich got to work untying her and took the cloth out of her mouth. She started coughing weakly but didn't move more than that.

"Ulrich!" Aelita's voice called from outside the kitchen. "Ulrich where are you?!"

"Aelita!" Ulrich called out and Aelita ran in and gasped, kneeling down she pulled Emma to a sitting position, leaning against the closed refrigerator door. She ran out of the room with a blanket from the living room and wrapped Emma up before looking back to Ulrich, looking alarmed at his leg, which was bleeding through the jacket.

"I was going down the stairs and the step gave out," Ulrich explained. "Don't run on old wooden stairs," he advised.

Aelita nodded, dialing Jeremie. "Hello, Jeremie? Ulrich found Emma… she's okay, just freezing. The spectre shoved her into the refrigerator! Took out all of the shelves and stuff, I guess… and Ulrich is hurt so what are we going to do?"

She nodded and hung out after Jeremie told her whatever he told her. "Odd stopped the Spectre and he's back in the lab with Jeremie. They say that since nobody found out about the lab and nobody got fatally injured, we won't do a return to the past. They are going to come here to see about your condition and when we're ready, we'll go to Yumi's house," she said to Ulrich.

Aelita found an old mug and cleaned it. She heated up a cup of water and gave it to Emma to hold onto and drink. She found a first aid kit in the bathroom and took Ulrich's jacket off the wound and started tending to it, cleaning it and properly bandaging it. "Tonight you stay off your leg while we're at Yumi's," she told him.

"No choice, it hurts like a bitch… anyway, thank you." Ulrich smiled his appreciation.

"Yeah, thanks Aelita," Emma chimed up softly. "And Ulrich, Who knows how long I would have been stuck in the fridge for if it wasn't for you…"

"I'm just glad it wasn't the freezer… even so I'm glad I found you as fast as I did too," Ulrich replied. "Good thing you still had your phone."

"When X.A.N.A. did that to me, sending a Polymorphic Spectre to trap me, I didn't have my phone," Odd said from the entryway to the kitchen. "Yumi just barely found me in time."

Jeremie and Odd came and joined them on the floor, Odd cuddling Emma, trying to help warm her back up. After about half an hour Emma was warm enough to go back to Kadic to get her things together for Yumi's and go with them. Jeremie and Aelita took Ulrich straight to Yumi's so no one at the school would see his injury.

Odd went to his room to get his and Ulrich's stuff for the weekend and grabbed some things out of Jeremie's room for him. Emma was getting her stuff and also getting Aelita's stuff as well. They met on the main floor of the dorm building and walked together to Yumi's.


	39. Parties and Headaches

When Odd and I got to Yumi's house I plopped down on the floor and decided not to get up from that spot unless I really needed to. Everyone else seemed to have the same idea.

A few other kids that I didn't know very well were already sitting around talking, and Ulrich, Jeremie, and Aelita were all engaging in conversation. Odd went into the kitchen and came back out with two plastic cups. He took a seat beside me and handed me a cup.

"This will warm you up in no time," he stated and I raised an eyebrow, not understanding. I took a swig of it, expecting juice or soda or something but got an entirely different taste.

"Brandy?" I hissed at him. "Where did you get this?"

"Yumi's dad has so much alcohol in this house it's ridiculous. Don't worry I asked her and she said it was fine as long as we take it easy," Odd replied. I really wasn't mad at all, in fact I was kind of glad. I liked brandy, the taste of it was great. My father would have a bottle every Christmas and he would let me have some too. Of course he always watered it down, this was my first time having it straight.

"Emma!" Someone from the other side of the room called. "You were a ninja with that rat lab today! How could you do that? It was so gross!"

I raised and eyebrow and looked at Jeremie and Aelita, wondering what the hell he was talking about.

"We did a lab where we dissected and labeled rat organs and stuff. Your clone did it all in like five minutes," Odd explained quietly.

"Yeah, it was an easy lab for me, I guess," I said to the boy who had already gone back to talking with Ulrich about soccer.

I took another swig of brandy and really felt it warming my insides. I grabbed a pillow from the couch and scooted over to a wall and Odd followed. We situated ourselves into a cuddly position. Ulrich was sitting on the couch with his leg resting on a pillow. Jeremie and Aelita were cuddling at the other end of the couch and Yumi was buzzing around talking to everyone. It wasn't much of a party, but it was nice.

"So who's hungry?" Yumi asked, pulling some trays out of the kitchen. One tray had sliced up cheese and bread, the other had slices of meat. She went back to grab a third tray that had sushi. "I also have soup if anyone wants some."

"I would love some soup," I said with a smile. She nodded at me and went back into the kitchen. A few minutes later she came out with a bowl of miso soup. "Thanks, Yumi!" I said and took it from her.

A few hours of everyone sitting around on the floor, talking, drinking brandy and eating bread, cheese, and sushi, and the non-warriors headed back to Kadic. Of course they hadn't had any brandy because they knew Jim would smell it on them immediately. Ulrich was getting pretty wasted and Yumi was following suit. Odd wasn't very drunk but he sure acted like it. Jeremie and Aelita opted out of drinking, while I opted to drink more than any of them.

"Yumi, the bottle is empty!" I said loudly. "Can I open the next one?"

"Emma, I'm cutting you off," Aelita said, grabbing my hand and pulling me out of the kitchen. "Sit with Odd and relax," she suggested and I bounded over to my boyfriend and kissed him, almost falling on top of him.

"No more alcohol," Jeremie announced. "You've all had enough." He put a movie on and he and Aelita made sure everyone was situated before turning off the lights.

After a few minutes of the movie I realized that Ulrich and Yumi were making out on the couch next to Odd and I. I giggled and pointed it out to Odd, who seemed less than interested in them. Instead of responding about them, he rolled on top of me and started kissing me, sticking his tongue hungrily in my mouth. I could taste the brandy in his breath and loved it. It was absolutely intoxicating. I wrapped my legs around him and fed my tongue into his mouth in return and felt the room heat up.

"It's too hot in here," I breathed and looked at Odd. He pulled me up and clumsily carried me out of the room, into another one. He set me down on the floor and I looked up at him. "It's still hot," I stated.

"Take off your shirt, you have an undershirt on, don't you?" he asked. I obliged, taking off my shirt and throwing it at a wall. He followed suit, taking off his shirt, revealing perfect abs. We resumed making out.

I felt his hand slink underneath my undershirt and he waited for my response before he proceeded to grab my breast. I moaned with pleasure and he continued. I tried focusing on making out while he explored my upper body. I kept my hands to myself, I wasn't drunk enough to explore his body… though it did sound like a nice idea…

"Guys!" Aelita blurted from the doorway. "Odd!" She shrieked. He pulled his hands away from me and I felt my body go cold as he got up. I sat up and shook my head, wishing that would make my hair go back to normal. "Guys, I can't in my right mind let you do these things while you're drunk, I'm sorry but can you come back and just watch the movie?" Aelita asked, handing me back my shirt. I took it and let her help me up and the three of us went back to the living room. Jeremie had gotten Yumi and Ulrich to stop too. The rest of the night was kind of tame compared to the twenty minutes of passion between Odd and I. We all fell asleep sometime during the movie.

When I woke up I felt the biggest headache, I looked around to see everyone else was still asleep, even Aelita and Jeremie. I got up slowly and stretched, feeling sore all over. I walked upstairs and found Yumi's bathroom, figuring that she wouldn't mind if I took a quick shower. I cleaned up and felt a lot better afterward. I changed in the bathroom and brushed my teeth and my hair before I went back downstairs.

Jeremie was awake now, checking his laptop. When I came downstairs he glanced up at me. "Hows the headache?" he asked with a smirk.

"Shut up," I muttered. I plopped back down in my spot next to the sleeping Odd and closed my eyes to get a little more sleep before everyone else woke up.

When I woke up everyone was up now. I saw Aelita changing Ulrich's bandages and Odd was changing in a corner of the living room. Yumi was groggily walking into the kitchen. Odd was the first person to notice I was awake. He came over to me when he was done changing and sat down next to me.

"Yumi's finding some breakfast," he told me. "I think today we're just going to lie low and maybe go out to lunch, all of us, later. Sound good?"

I nodded and then remembered what we'd done last night and groaned, blushing furiously. "Last night was way too insane. Who's dumb idea was it to get the brandy out?" I mumbled into a pillow.

"Mine," Odd said, he rubbed my back. "It really wasn't bad. Nobody did anything bad."

I thought about it and agreed with him; sure what we'd done took things to a new level, but I didn't regret it at all. I looked up at him and smiled, nodding. "We all had a good time?"

"Personally I would have preferred my friends be sober, but nobody got hurt so no harm, no foul," Aelita chimed in. "And Ulrich and Yumi finally took things further in their relationship too!"

Ulrich shook his head, tuning into the conversation then. "What?" he asked her.

"Oh shit, he doesn't remember what they did," Odd snickered. Yumi poked her head into the room, hearing this. She stood in the doorway staring at Odd and I.

"What did we do?" She blushed as she asked.

"You were all over each other," Jeremie responded. "It was a pain getting you two apart. You weren't as bad as Odd and Emma, they actually left the room when Aelita and I weren't paying attention."

I blushed, "Jeremie! We didn't do what you're thinking."

"Just… what would it be, second base?" Aelita asked. "If I hadn't stopped you two, who knows where it would have gone."

"Thanks for the faith," I said, a little annoyed. "I wasn't drunk enough to make any mistakes like that."

"And I wouldn't have taken advantage like that even if she was," Odd defended himself. "I didn't even drink that much."

"How come?" I asked.

"He's the biggest lightweight in the room," Ulrich answered. "It comes with the scrawny territory."

Odd argued that he isn't scrawny and I assured him that he's not. Aelita went with Yumi to help her find breakfast and they emerged with a stack of bowls, milk, and several cereal boxes. We passed around what we wanted and sat around eating while Jeremie announced that the Replika Scanner was done and functioning. We discussed where we wanted to go for lunch and decided on ordering food instead of actually going out.

Yumi took a shower after breakfast and the rest of us just kind of laid around in the living room, talking idly. Odd was playing a hand held video game, Ulrich was playing checkers with Aelita, and Jeremie was still on his laptop. As for me, I was just sleeping on and off.

When it came time for lunch Jeremie, Ulrich, and Odd put their money together and we phoned in our orders and Jeremie and Aelita went to go pick the food up since the restaurant was right around the corner. When they came back the delicious scent of Italian food filled the air. Jeremie passed out the food, calling out the order to make sure he gave everyone the right food. "And the gnocchi is for Emma," he said, handing me the last tin. I set the dish down on the floor in front of me and flipped the aluminum seal off the sides and lifted the lid up. I inhaled the spicy marinara sauce and gave it a minute for the heat to vent up and out of the food before I took my first bite.

"How is it?" Odd asked, already half done with his pizza.

"Good, not as good as in Sanremo, but good," I replied, taking another bite.

Jeremie handed me the piece of bread that came with the meal and I dipped it into the sauce, gobbling that up. I finished my food soon after Odd did and we both sat back on the couch and I watched him play the handheld game. The rest of the afternoon was very relaxed, except for the parts where Ulrich and Yumi demanded to know more about their exploits from the night before.

"Your true feelings for each other came out, that's all there is to it," I said to them one of those times. "Don't even worry, you didn't even get that freaky. Odd and I get freakier sober."

Odd and I both blushed as I said that. The others laughed but didn't comment on my comment. They knew we were both being cautious in our relationship while still having fun.

That night Odd and I decided to go for a walk together. And this time we won't get in trouble," he said as we left Yumi's house. It was already getting dark outside but that didn't stop us. He took me to a road that paralleled the river and we walked along the bank together.

"So, I want to know," he started after a few minutes of comfortable silence. "I want to know what you feel about what happened last night," he finished.

"I feel like it was a little out of control and messy but I don't regret any of it," I replied confidently. "Even going to second base, as Aelita said… it was nice and I was completely comfortable with it," I assured him. "You?"

"I was nervous as fuck," he blurted quietly. "I always want to do what makes you happy, and I wasn't sure if that was it yet."

"I love you, and I feel like we're going pretty well," I told him. "You never make me feel uncomfortable, you're perfect."

"Stop talking about yourself," he told me and smiled. "I'm walking with perfection."

"You're walking with damaged perfection," I corrected.

"Why do you say that?" he asked curiously.

"I think we're all damaged in some way because of one X.A.N.A. attack or another. You can't tell me that you don't feel that way."

Odd seemed thoughtful and then he nodded slowly, we left that conversation there and walked back to Yumi's house. The others were still just lying around doing nothing. The only difference is that Yumi probably made them all clean up because the living room went back to looking spotless. The scent of alcohol was even fading. You'd never be able to tell that we'd partied last night, which was a very good thing.


	40. Teleportation

The next morning the six of us woke up at an earlier time and packed up the little bit of our stuff. Yumi went to the factory while the rest of us went to Kadic to drop our stuff off and report to Principal Delmas.

"Ulrich, how is your leg?" I asked him when we left the principal's office.

"Fine as long as I don't run or put a lot of pressure on it," he told me. "I should be fine in Lyoko." I nodded and smiled, I was glad he wasn't hurt too badly because of me. I wouldn't be able to handle it if he'd gotten hurt worse because I got myself trapped by X.A.N.A. again.

We stopped at the vending machine so we could all have a round of hot chocolate before we went to the factory. I got coffee, as I always do.

"Why do you always get coffee?" Jeremie asked me.

"I like it, it honestly tastes better than anything else from this machine," I responded. "Plus I need all the energy I can get and sleep doesn't do it for me."

"That's too bad, has it always been like that for you?" Aelita asked.

I nodded. "It's all good, let's go!"

"I'm sure Yumi is getting bored," Ulrich stated as we headed for the manhole in the park. The trip was no different than any of our other trips, Odd, and I raced while Jeremie, Ulrich and Aelita followed along at a more casual pace.

Yumi was on the super computer when we got there, reading Jeremie's notes. We'd all been asked to do that every now and then so we were all well-educated on how to use the computer. We could all use the basic programs, like virtualizing people, weapons, and vehicles; we could also rematerialize people too.

The five of us went down to the scanners and we did our dance, virtualizing into Sector Five and getting onto the skid. The journey through the digital sea was actually quiet, not a monster in sight to derail us. When we reached the replika, things started to get interesting.

"So what I'm going to do is what I call teleportation," Jeremie started. "I'll send Odd and Aelita first. Yumi, Ulrich, and Emma stay and guard the skid."

"Jeremie, I don't think we'll need three guards," Ulrich said.

"Yeah, there should be three people to go to the real world because of how many unknown factors there are," I agreed.

"Fine then Emma, you can go too. Yumi and Ulrich will stay and guard the skid. Ready?" Jeremie asked.

"Go for it!" Odd urged. At that moment I felt myself being transferred to a new place from my spot in the skid. I looked around and couldn't believe my eyes.

"Whoa," I breathed. "Jeremie, it's night time here… and it looks like you sent us to a jungle."

Odd and Aelita both appeared then and they had the same reaction as I did. Aelita jumped up onto a fallen tree and turned to face Odd and I. We were all in our Lyoko forms. "Jeremie, we're still in our Lyoko forms, how come?" Odd asked.

"The teleportation isn't like a real devirtualization, you're more like spectres," Jeremie responded. "Now you have limited time to find a super computer before the teleportation times out."

"Where do you expect us to find a super computer? Behind a tree?" Odd asked sarrcasticallly.

"We're in the middle of a jungle," I pointed out to Jeremie. "It's not likely we'll find ot any time soon."

"Not likely, but very possible," Aelita interjected. "Look over here!"

Odd and I moved to stand near Aelita to see what she was referring to. There was a whole facility built here, I couldn't believe it.

"Nice work, Aelita," Jeremie praised. "Go on in and get to looking!"

And so we did, walking together to the entrance. Aelita and I took one side and Odd took the other. We met in the middle and checked inside to make sure no one was there to stop us.

"Which way should we go?" Aelita asked. The hallway stretched both ways.

"This way," Odd said, pointing to the left.

"How can you be sure?" I asked him.

"My sense of direction is infallible," Odd responded quickly. Aelita and I followed him down the hallway. We turned a corner and Odd pulled me down and held a finger to his lip, looking up and I followed his gaze, there was a window. "Someone is in there," he mouthed. Aelita and I nodded and we crawled past the room slowly and quietly.

After we safely passed, I looked back to see it was a scientist, and he had the same stiff demeanor of anyone X.A.N.A.-fied. Odd continued leading the way through the building, looking into the small windows in each door as we passed.

"What is this?" he wondered upon looking into one room. We entered and approached a glass display window inside.

"Gross!" I hissed as a robot spider jumped onto the window.

"Jeremie, there are these spiders here," Aelita said.

"I don't know what they are here for but if X.A.N.A. wants them, it can't be good. Keep moving, though," Jeremie instructed.

"Shit," I cursed, turning to see the scientist was blocking our path out. Odd and Aelita both took offensive positions.

"Laser arrow!" Odd shouted, sending two lasers at the man. He dodged them both and sent his own attack at Odd. He dodged the first one but the second clipped his shoulder and sent him flying into a wall. Aelita jumped up.

"Energy field!" She sent the glowing orb at the man, who dodged and sent Electricity at Aelita, who fused two energy fields as a shield.

I picked up a wooden plank and swung it at the scientist while he was distracted with Aelita. He passed out cold and I looked down at him, pleased with myself.

Odd looked out in the hallway and found another room with a lock. He hoisted the scientist up and dragged him toward the room. Aelita and I followed.

The scientist woke up then and sent Odd flying to the end of the hallway. He started walking toward Odd when Aelita sent him flying into the room Odd was trying to lock him in. I closed the door with the key pad and locked it.

"You two make great spectres," Odd complimented, approaching us.

"We make a great team," I responded with a smile.

"We still have a super computer to find," Aelita pointed out and we set off again down the hallway.

"Guys, hurry up. Yumi and Ulrich have their hands full with tarantulas," Jeremie said to us as we continued our search.

"We're moving as fast as we can," I assured him.

"Infallible sense of direction," Aelita laughed, sounding annoyed. "I was so sure we should have gone the other way!"

"You so sure?" Odd asked, grinning as he looked through a window in one of the doors in the hallway. Aelita and I looked in to see a supercomputer. Odd tried opening the door but there was an access code to punch in and we didn't know it.

"Let me handle this," Aelita said, holding her hand up to the key pad and it flickered green and the door slid open for us.

"Woohoo!" I cheered as we entered. "So what do we do now?"

"Destroy it," Odd replied. He held out his arm. "Laser arrow!"

The laser arrow didn't even get near the computer. Odd scowled. "What's up with this?" I asked. "There's a barrier protecting it."

"There should be a power source or something. A spot that the shield is getting its energy from," Jeremie replied. "You need to figure it out for yourselves, I can't do anything from here," Jeremie replied.

"There!" Aelita announced, pointing to a small target. I had to squint to see it at first.

"Small target, no one could possibly hit that! Except for me, of course," Odd said enthusiastically.

The scientist entered the room then, looking pissed off. Aelita and I turned to hold him off as Odd fired at the target and disabled the shield.

"Odd hurry up and destroy it!" I shouted, firing at the scientist.

"Yumi's been devirtualized," Jeremie shouted at us. "X.A.N.A. 's taking over the tower I'm using to run the teleportation!"

"But -," I tried protesting when I fizzed out of the real world, back to the skid. I felt woozy but fine. I could see several tarantulas firing at the skid and braced myself as I started feeling the assault.

"What just happened?" I asked.

"Yeah, Einstein, what happened?" Odd added.

"You're back on the replika. Aelita, get out of there!" Jeremie directed. Aelita did just that, separating the skid from the tower and plunging the craft into the digital sea.


	41. Another Go

"We did our best," Ulrich said when everyone was back in the lab. "We shouldn't beat ourselves up over this."

"But X.A.N.A. is getting stronger with every time we fail," Jeremie said sadly.

"We'll go back and finish what we started whenever you want us to," I said.

"We need to find out what X.A.N.A. wants to do with those cybernetic spiders," Aelita chimed in.

"And we will," Yumi responded.

"After I sleep for a few years," Odd added and yawned.

The rest of Sunday was pretty lazy, everyone except for Jeremie and Aelita hung out in the rec room and played games. Jeremie and Aelita stayed in the factory to up toe Skid's defenses.

Monday went by smooth as melted butter. After gym class Jeremie announced that we'd be going back to destroy the super computer tonight.

"You mean we're going back already?" Ulrich asked, sounding excited.

"Odd knocked out the shield last time, it should be a piece of cake!" Jeremie responded.

"Great, then we'll meet up in the factory later on tonight," I said. Everyone nodded in agreement and we went about the rest of our day. I don't know about the others, but I was excited to go back there. I pumped myself up all day.

In the skid, Jeremie announced who would be going. "Yumi, Ulrich, and Emma will go, Odd and Aelita, you two get to protect the Skid," he told us.

"Yay, I get to go back!" I cheered.

"No fair, you get to have all the fun," Odd pouted.

Jeremie teleported Ulrich, Yumi, and I straight into the lab and we looked around, orientating ourselves with out surrounding. "Jeremie your teleportation is pretty accurate," Yumi praised.

"Thanks, I try," Jeremie replied with chuckle. "Now, I'll guide you to the super computer."

That he did, within minutes we were face to face with the entrance to the room with the Super Computer. "But it's locked," Yumi said when she tried the key pad.

"Aelita used her ability to open it last time… Uh, hold on," Jeremie replied, trying to open it himself from his lab.

"I got this," Ulrich said, stabbing the pad with a katana. The touch screen cracked and shut down. Yumi and I glared at him.

"Nice going, genius!" I rolled my eyes.

"I told you to hold on, Ulrich!" Jeremie exclaimed. "Now you need to go shut down the generator. Give me a minute while I locate it."

"Sorry, just seemed like the right thing to do," Ulrich said sheepishly.

"Next time, think first," Yumi told him. I leaned on the wall, hoping that nothing would start up to stop us from reaching our objective.

"I found it!" Jeremie announced. "but I have bad news, X.A.N.A. just activated a tower on the replika. Odd and Aelita have their hands full protecting the skid so I don't know how quickly they will be able to deactivate it. Watch your backs."

"I'll go take care of the generator, you two stay together and wait here to take out the super computer when I turn the generator off," Ulrich told us.

Yumi and I continued to stand around while Jeremie directed Ulrich to the generator. We decided to explore a little bit in the area. We found a room void of any scientists and explored it. There wasn't much that was interesting at all so we decided to go back to the super computer. When we turned around we saw two cybernetic spiders blocking our path. I looked to our right to see there was also one blocking that way out.

"How ugly," Yumi said, disgusted.

"Jeremie we know why X.A.N.A. activated the tower," I said, taking aim at a spider. Yumi whipped out her metal fans and sent it flying at the other one in front of us. I fired at both the one to our side and the last one in front of us and we cleared a path out of the room.

"Ulrich is destroying the generator now, get back to the super computer!" Jeremie said urgently. "I'll let Odd and Aelita know what's going on." Just then the lights began to flicker and we paused to get a good view. When we reached the super computer room the lights were back on and we still didn't have access to the room. "Bad news guys…" Jeremie started before we could let him know.

"There is a backup generator?" I guessed before he could continue. "Tell Ulrich to come back here and we'll figure out a game plan."

"Way ahead of you. Jeremie, where is the backup generator?" Ulrich asked, approaching us, slashing into a creepy spider on his way.

"I need to locate it. Hang in there," Jeremie told us.

"That helps us," Yumi muttered, flinging her fans at two separate spiders. As they came back the three of us went back to back, defending ourselves and taking down spiders all at once. Spiders were coming from all angles.

"I found it!" Jeremie said. I jumped over a group of spiders and fired a stream of laser bullets at them as I moved. "Emma, you go disable it, you should be able to handle it. Aelita is on her way to deactivate the tower and Odd has just defeated all of the tarantulas. He's on a roll today. anyway, I'm sending him to help you."

I watched as Yumi and Ulrich knocked each other out and I ran full speed following the instructions Jeremie gave me. Odd materialized right in front of me and I nearly ran into him.

"It's outside," I panted and grabbed his hand, we ran together outside and skidded to a halt when we saw the welcoming party.

"Holy shit," Odd breathed. "Jeremie, the backup generator is a real popular spot."

"Fight through them. You've got to take out the generator," Jeremie told us. Odd and I looked at each other, thinking of what we could do.

"You plow through to the generator and I'll cover you," I told him. He nodded and we charged forward. I sent bullets flying at every spider in sight and soon enough had most of them down. I stood watching Odd and felt something brush against my leg. I looked down too late to see a cybernetic spider that had been hiding from us. It attacked me and I felt the teleportation end. I returned to the skid, out cold.

A few minutes passed and I started regaining consciousness. I heard Odd talking to Jeremie and telling Ulrich to go back to sleep.

I watched in awe as the copy of the forest sector began disappearing. Odd piloted us out of the replika before it shattered and led us through the digital sea and back home.


	42. Blackmail

"I'm pretty awesome," Odd said as our scanners opened up. He had a proud grin on his face and I rolled my eyes.

"I'm less awesome, I can't believe that damned spider snuck up on me," I cursed. "I'm so lame."

"We all have our ups and downs," Odd consoled. "Beside, you were busy watching me be awesome!"

I rolled my eyes theatrically and shoved him lightly. We waited as the rest of the group emerged from scanners and we went up to see Jeremie.

"There are a lot of them out there…" Jeremie said as we came out of the elevator. :This is going to take a long time if we want to get rid of them all."

"We'll do it, we'll just send Odd in to get rid of them all," I told him. "After all, he's awesome," I added, sarcastically.

"He can just take his shoes off in the network and that will send them all into oblivion," Ulrich agreed. We all shared a nice laugh at Odd's expense and left the factory to go back to school.

"Odd and I should go, Mr. Chardin is not too happy with us for being so behind on the film," I said as we exited the manhole into the park. "Instead of filming us having fun we just had fun without filming. Oops."

"We shouldn't need to go back to the factory again until we locate a replika. I'll keep everyone posted."

We all went our separate ways. Odd and I stayed in the studio computer lab editing the film all night. I found myself falling asleep toward the end of editing and Odd told me to let him finish it, we were almost done anyway. I sat down in a couch in the corner and unwillingly drifted off to sleep.

"Emma, we're done! I'll leave the file on the flash drive and leave it in Chardin's office with a note," Odd told me, waking me up from my sleep. I nodded groggily and slouched back down in the couch.

Before I knew it Odd was back, shutting off the computers and putting the equipment away. I was still pretty sleepy but I started getting up to walk with him back to the dorms.

"No, you're tired. Want a ride?" he asked me, standing directly in front of me.

"I don't understand," I said and he smiled, picking me up bridal style and leaning in to kiss me. "You spoil me," I smiled back.

Odd carried me that way back to the dorms and I slung my arms around his neck, smiling into his chest. He might be "svelte" but he was definitely very strong. I couldn't believe how good whe was to me. When we got to my room he hung out with me. I changed into night clothes while he covered his eyes. He laid down together in my bed and talked all night like we always did. Before I knew it, I was drifting to sleep again.

"I'll see you in the morning," he said when he saw I was half asleep. I reached out and wrapped my arms around him to stop him.

"I don't want you to leave me," I murmured. "Never leave me."

I opened my heavy eyelids and saw he was looking deep into my face. He smiled and kissed me softly. He snuggled deeper into my bed and wrapped his arms around me. "I'll never leave you. You promise there's no morning inspection tomorrow?" he asked with a grin.

"No inspection," I replied and fell back to sleep. I had dreams filled with him, filled with love. I had a dream that we would grow old together and move to Sanremo to be artists with a family as big as his. We would help my family to prosper the way we would… Everything would be perfect. X.A.N.A. would be defeated and the world would be safe forever.

When I woke up Odd was still sleeping beside me. I smiled and watched him sleep until my alarm went off and woke him up. He looked around and sat up, stretching. He looked down at me and smiled.

"Think we'll get away with this, this time?" he asked me.

"Go upstairs before Jim does his rounds," I told him with a quiet smile. "I need to start getting ready. I'll see you at breakfast. Thank you for staying with me."

"What wouldn't I do for you?" he asked me. He landed a kiss on my forehead before he slipped his shoes on and slipped out of my room. A minute later, when I was gathering my bathroom things, my door burst open again. I spun to face Sissi.

"So, does Odd spend the night in here often?" she asked. "Or do you sleep in his room a lot? Nicholas and Herve told me all about the morning when you were caught on the boys floor in the morning and I know you weren't just returning a book to Odd."

"Sissi, he'd left his textbook in the library the day before and ran off without it. I was returning it to him because we had a test that day," I told her, getting annoyed. "Please leave, I'm going to go take a shower."

"Not so fast, Emma," she blocked my way out. "I also happen to have some video footage of Odd carrying you to your room last night and not coming out until five minutes ago. Do you want me to show my father?"

My eyes widened, I was dumbfounded. I couldn't believe my ears. All I could bring myself to do was stare in disbelief. "What do you want, Sissi?" I asked, trying to play it cool.

"I want you to tell me what you've all been up to ever since Ulrich started hanging out with Jeremie, Odd, and Yumi. And where did Aelita come from? She came out of nowhere and immediately started hanging out with them…"

I looked at her incredulously. "Well I know Odd introduced himself to Ulrich because he was moving into his room…" I started. "And Ulrich and Jeremie already knew each other. Maybe the friendship just happened? Not everyone follows the rules of cliques," I said to her tersely. "Aelita is Odd's cousin, so naturally she would meet his friends. Obviously she and Jeremie are romantically involved so there you go. I think you need to stop obsessing over us and just leave us alone!"

"I could leave you alone or…" she smiled deviously. "I could show that tape to my father. Be nice to me, Emma Kozlov. I can send you back to Siberia so fast it could make your head spin. Even if you won't give me answers, I can make your life hell in other ways."

With that she left my room and I just stood in the middle of my room, baffled. A rising fear sprouted in my gut. I went to the bathroom in a daze, took a shower, washed my face, and brushed my teeth. I got dressed in my room and went down to the cafeteria for breakfast. Thinking about Sissi's threat the whole way, wondering how much trouble this would really be.


	43. Not Going Anywhere

Everyone was already there when I sat down between Odd and Ulrich. "Something wrong?" Odd asked, seeing the look in my eyes.

"Nothing," I told him and forced a smile. "Just worried about the test today."

When I finished breakfast I went to the first class. When I got there I saw Sissi and her two goons were already seated. Sissi sat alone in the second row and Herve and Nicholas sat together at a table next to hers. She smiled at me and I scowled, heading to a table in the back.

"Hold on, Emma," Sissi said, making me turn to face her. "You should sit with me today for the test."

"You've got to be kidding me," I said abruptly. I saw the dangerous look in her eye and knew she was serious. I sighed and took the seat beside her. She smiled victoriously and I put my head down. I saw when Odd, Ulrich, Jeremie, and Aelita came in and wouldn't look at them, no matter how much they tried getting my attention. The whole classroom began filling up and Mrs. Meyer came in last, closing the door behind her.

"Okay class, prepare yourselves for the test. If you studied, it will be easy. Clear your desks beside a piece of scrap paper and a pencil."

Mrs. Meyer passed out the test and I started on it. I hadn't studied, but this was still a very easy test. I finished it within twenty minutes and was about to hand it in with my scrap paper to show my work when I felt Sissi jab my leg with her pencil.

"Let me turn in your test as mine," she hissed quietly. I glared at her and nodded slowly. We waited while Mrs. Meyer had her back to us and made the test switch. She changed a few things on the test and scratched out my name, putting her own. I gritted my teeth and started redoing the whole test for myself and put my name down. She handed her test in first and then I took mine to Mrs. Meyer.

"Emma, usually you're done faster, was this test more difficult for you?" she asked when I handed it to her.

"You could say that," I muttered and went back to my seat and put my head down, feeling completely terrible. When class ended I was the first one out the door. Sissi caught up to me and caught me by the arm.

"That was great! Thanks a lot, I forgot to study last night," she said to me. I stared at her in disgust and took my arm back.

"You're despicable," I said angrily. "I've never cheated before in my life and that broke every moral code in my body."

Odd and Ulrich found Sissi and I then and gave me a confused look.

"We saw what you two did," Ulrich said. "Emma, why did you do that?"

Sissi gave me a look and I bit the inside of my cheek, hating myself. "She forgot to study last night; I was giving her a hand."

"You're lucky she didn't catch you," Odd stated. "Mrs. Meyer is usually really good at catching cheaters."

I gave him a quick pleading look before I escaped to the vending machines. I meant to press the coffee button but ordered soup instead. I punched the machine as the gross soup poured into a cup.

"What's going on?" Aelita asked, making me jump. I turned to see she was leaning on the wall. I scowled and grabbed my soup.

"Odd spent the night in my room last night," I started quietly, looking around to make sure no one was around. "And Sissi has proof of it. She's black mailing me. Also, Herve and Nichilas told her about the time I was caught on the boys' floor. She knows about that too."

Aelita looked at me in shock and shook her head. "But… that jerk!" she exclaimed. I covered her mouth and glanced around again.

"I don't want this getting around. I want to figure this out myself," I said to her urgently. "Don't tell the boys about this. I'll fix this!"

She licked my hand and I pulled away, wiping my hand on my jeans. She scowled unhappily but nodded. "If this becomes a real problem though, I'm telling Jeremie and the others."

"Deal," I told her and gave her a weak smile. I choked down the soup and we walked together to our next class. For this class, Sissi came in late so she couldn't sucker me into sitting with her. Isat with Aelita and we just quietly focused on the lecture and started on the homework together.

I skipped lunch to see Mr. Chardin about the film. He praised our hard work and we discussed a viewing event and I thought about it; who would want to come see this? I told him I was fine with it as long as Odd was too and it wasn't mandatory to attend, I didn't want people to hate me for forcing them to watch something they didn't want to see.

After my meeting I snuck off campus to buy a bag of chips and a can of soda from a vender and ate them on a bench. I went back to school and walked to my science class alone. When I got there Sissi and Odd were yelling at each other.

"What did you do?" Odd asked her furiously.

"Nothing," Sissi said, putting on a confused face. "Odd, I didn't do anything to anyone."

"Odd," I said, walking into the room. "Don't yell at Sissi," I said. It hurt my heart but he backed off. Sissi gave me a smug grin and I rolled my eyes. "I'm sitting alone today," I told her before she could pat the seat next to her. She scowled but I ignored her. I walked passed her table and avoiding Odd's eyes and I passed his. I took the table in the back and put my head down until Mrs. Hertz came in, demanding quiet. She told us to check our petri dishes for any changes in the cultures and I did so alone, avoiding any conversation with Odd. For the rest of the hour she told us to take notes on a documentary about anatomy. I took down notes quietly while my mind wandered.

Why did Sissi choose to blackmail me? It's not like I can be any kind of asset to her other than helping her cheat on tests. It didn't quite add up completely. I figured I could try to talk to her maturely at dinner.

I felt my phone vibrate and looked at it; a message from Jeremie.

Jeremie: S.O.S. X.A.N.A. Meet at the factory.

Me: fine.

I raised my hand and stood up, "I'm sorry Mrs. Hertz I don't feel well. Can I go to the infirmary?"

"I'll take her," Sissi offered and I glowered at her. I looked over at Jeremie, Odd, and Ulrich and they looked irritated as well. Mrs. Hertz escused us and I walked silently with Sissi. I saw the bathrooms and had an idea.

"Sissi, I need to use the bathroom real quick. I'll be right out." I told her and ran in, closing myself into a stall. I sent Jeremie a message.

Me: I'll go to the infirmary with Sissi and when she's gone I'll go to the factory. Go on without me.

I flushed the toilet and left the stall, washing my hands and returning to Sissi. "So why didn't you want to sit with me in class?" she asked me.

"You're not seriously asking, are you?" I asked her as we started walking again to the infirmary. "You're blackmailing me. That's not the way you make people actually want to be around you, Sissi."

"I know that… it just seems that whenever I try being nice, nobody remembers that. They do remember when I do mean things though," she confided. I stopped and looked at her then, realization hitting me hard.

"You just want friends," I said. "That's why you act like a little diva? You think that will get you friends? You need to reevaluate your methods," I told her. "And just to let you know, we do notice when you're nice, the only problem is that we never know whether or not you're being genuinely nice or just trying to trick us."

She nodded, "well come on, lets get you to the infirmary."

"Plus you're just plain mean to everybody who doesn't share the same beliefs as you… you need to show more compassion and see the good instead of the different," I continued. "Little Milly especially, all she wants is to do what she loves and you always pull her down."

"Okay, okay!" Sissi put her hands up in resignation. "Fine, I'll be nicer to people… and I'll destroy that tape I have."

I smiled, "you will? That's so great," I said happily. We came to the infirmary. She opened the door and I walked in and sat down on the bed. "Thank you so much, Sissi," I said to her. The nurse was looking at me, curious.

"She feels sick," Sissis said to Yolanda. "Hope you feel better," she said to me and closed the door.

I looked at Yolanda and smiled weakly, feeling so much relief about Sissi calling off her blackmail. That was easier than I thought it would be, I thought.

"What's wrong with you?" Yolanda asked.

"I had a headache but it's passing. I think I'll go back to class in a few minutes," I said to her.

"You're not going anywhere," she said and I looked up at her again. Her usually kind face was twisted in anger and X.A.N.A.'s eye replaced her own.


	44. An Easy Target

I jumped up and took up a defensive position. I looked around for something I could use to distract her to get away. I looked at the window; it was open so I could easily jump through but the only thing keeping me from doing that was Yolanda menacingly approaching me. I groped at the first idea that came to mind and threw the bed sheet over her to slow her down while I ran for the window. She blew through the blanket just as I jumped through and shot me down with electricity, forcing me down onto the grass. I did everything I could to stop from expressing the pain that surged through my body.

I got up feebly and began running again, looking over my shoulder to see Yolanda chasing me. I pulled my phone out and called Aelita.

"Emma, where are you?" she asked upon answering.

"Yolanda is giving me a wellness test, right now she's testing my speed," I panted. "Deactivate the tower without me! Don't send any backup, I got this!"

I hung up and turned to face Yolanda, who was closer than I thought. She tackled me to the ground, holding me down with one arm while charging a ball of energy with another. I brought my knees up and pressed my feet against her midsection, pushing her off of me and rolling back onto my feet. I began running again, out of the Kadic Campus, toward the woods. I stopped in the middle of the forest and climbed up a tree, grabbing a loose branch I pulled it off the tree and waited for Yolanda to come looking for me.

"Come out, come out, Emam," Yolanda snarled as she came into view. She was looking left and right trying to find me, but she wasn't looking up and that's what screwed her. I jumped up, the branch above my head. I brought it down on her neck and sent her flying at a tree, out cold. I landed shakily on my feet and panted, this was more of a workout than I'd expected.

I headed further into the woods and found The Hermitage. I ran inside and found a closet just inside and slipped inside, kneeling and hugging my knees in the back, trying to take up as little space as possible. Maybe I could hide in here until Aelita deactivated the tower.

I heard Yolanda's heavy footsteps as she entered the house noisily and felt my pocket buzz. I answered it, "What's up?" I breathed, trying to stay quiet.

"Odd's insisting he come help you, where are you?" Jeremie asked.

"Hermitage," I hissed quickly as the door was torn open and Yolanda glared down at me and I gulped anxiously. She held out her hand and my phone shattered in my hand. I yelped as shards of it scraped me. She leaned in and grabbed me by my shirt and threw me out of the closet, I slammed against the wall. She stood over me and held her hand out again, sending purple electric sparks flying at me.

I felt my whole body burn as the electricity seeped through to my core. I wondered how this hadn't killed me before, it hurt so badly! I screamed and felt consciousness quickly slip away. And I felt my body go numb.

The electricity stopped suddenly and I looked up weakly to see Odd standing behind Yolanda with a metal lamp in his hands. A moment after than Yolanda fell to the ground, unconscious. Odd dropped the lamp and ran over to me. I shook him off and took a deep breath, shaking the fuzzy wooziness out of my head and sat up.

"That was fun," I mumbled and looked up at him. I tried a smile to see if that would ease his worry over me.

"Why is it always you lately?" he asked, sounding less than relaxed.

"Because I'm an easy target, you're all pretty good at fighting X.A.N.A. off because you've been doing it longer, I'm still a newbie," I told him. "I'd like to think I'm doing alright though."

Odd shook his head in frustration but didn't press it. He called Jeremie on his phone. "Jeremie, launch a return to the past now."


	45. That Went Well

Jeremie ran the return to the past and I found myself in my room, Odd was still in my room. He didn't seem willing to leave. I knew he knew Sissi was about to make an appearance, even if he didn't know any of the details.

"Go get ready for the day, Aelita will probably be here in a second so she can help me with Sissi," I told him. He left just as Aelita came in an plopped herself on my bed. She had her shower basket with her.

I smiled and offered a chipper "good morning!" and went around my room finding my shower stuff.

Sissi barged into my room and smirked at me. When she realized that Aelita was sitting in my room she faltered.

"Emma, can I talk to you in private?" she asked.

"Anything you tell me, you know I'll tell Aelita anyway," I told her. "You know that."

She glanced at Aelita, who smiled sweetly in return. Sissi then continued by blackmailing me all over again, her words were better chosen to avoid pissing Aelita off, but she did it all the same. And I took it, I let her blackmail me because I knew I'd fix it later anyway.

Aelita and I went to take showers and get ready for classes. At breakfast nobody really said much. I told them all about what was happening and that I would just sit with Sissi for the test and let her cheat and then we would approach her at lunch. Odd and I would talk to Mr. Chardin before dinner.

So Mrs. Meyer's class went by much the same way it did the first time. I even changed my handwriting to mimic Sissi's for her; she seemed pleasantly surprised. I redid the whole thing in my own handwriting and turned it in. Mrs. Meyer didn't seem concerned in the slightest. At the end of class I walked with Sissi from the classroom.

"Do you want to get some hot chocolate or coffee before our next class?" I asked her.

She seemed surprised, as she was during math class. "Oh, sure."

We walked to the vending machines and Odd, Ulrich, and Aelita met with us and we all talked casually until our next class. At lunch we invited Sissi to sit with us.

"So Sissi," I began at one point. "We need to talk. Aelita and I told the others about your blackmailing me."

She didn't seem surprised but she did seem to become nervous. "You did?"

"And we talked briefly during our last class," Aelita said. "We want to ask you to stop. We know you don't like doing it any more than we like enduring it."

"If you want to keep being friends with us, stop trying to mess us up," Ulrich said.

"Because it's really not cool," Odd finished.

Sissi scowled. "Did you guys rehearse that or what?"

"Kind of, yeah," I admitted. "Seriously though, can you just tell us why you tried blackmailing me? And using my relationship against me… you know that's not very nice."

Sissi looked down at her food. "Well I honestly just want to be friends with all of you. I just wish I could be included in some of the things you guys do together; you're always sneaking around together…"

"I'll be the first to admit that we're pretty awesome and we have a shitload of fun hanging out, but you have to admit your methods of trying to get into our group are pretty messed up and unorthodox," Odd said. He shoved a spoonful of chocolate dessert in his mouth and waited for Sissi's response.

"I know," Sissi said remorsefully. "I'm really sorry for all of the stuff I've done and said to all of you. Especially you, Emma," she said, looking directly at me. "You're such a nice person and I treated you really bad when you came here."

"Sissi, it's okay. I don't hold grudges," I told her with a smile.

"Sissi, can we trust you to stop trying to mess us up if we promise to include you more?" Ulrich asked. I don't think he realized that his charm was turned on. Yumi glanced at him before returning to her dessert.

"Okay, I'll go delete the footage I have then," she said. She finished the last bite of her dessert and stood up. "And I'm sorry I've been giving you two trouble," she said to Odd and I before walking off.

"That went really well," I said happily.

"I hope it will stick," Jeremie said. "She seemed sincere but you can never be sure."

"Hope so," Yumi said. "It would be really nice if we didn't need to worry about her snooping around like before."


	46. Ambush

The next night I was working on homework when I looked down at my phone to see Jeremie was calling me. "Jeremie?" I answered. "What's up?"

"I've been trying to reach you for half an hour," he informed me and I looked down at the screen to see it was still on silent from when I had it silent during classes. Oops.

"Sorry, my phone is on silent. Is X.A.N.A. attacking?" I asked, worried.

"No. I found a Replika and we're going to go destroy it. Odd, Aelita, Yumi, and Ulrich are already virtualized and they are waiting for you."

"On my way!" I announced and put on my hoodie and shoes and left my room, locking it behind me. I headed for the boiler room and then traveled through the sewers. I reached the ladder that would lead me to the opening in the bridge. I slid down the rope to the elevator and pressed the proper red button and went down to the scanners. "I'm here, Einstein. Send me in," I said, getting into my usual scanner.

"Transfer: Emma, Scanner: Emma, virtualization!" he said as he sent me to the fifth sector of Lyoko. He virtualized me right on top of my Overmorph and I zoomed to the Skid garage, where I saw everyone waiting for me, I jumped onto my transporter spot.

"Energize," Jeremie said and I closed my eyes and found myself sitting in my nav skid.

"Miss me, guys?" I asked.

"Where were you?" Ulrich asked, sounding irritated. "We waited for like, half an hour!"

"Ulrich," Aelita scolded. "Calm down, You've been late before too."

"I was studying and my phone was on silent, sorry!" I said as we left Lyoko.

"Studying," Odd snorted, "what a nerd!" he laughed and I rolled my eyes.

"You could afford to do some studying," I told him. "I saw your last test…"

"Don't waste your breath, Emma," Ulrich mumbled. "Aelita, for once there aren't any monsters, what gives?"

"We're lucky, I guess," Aelita responded. "We're here," she announced a moment later. She activated the digital key and Jeremie went to work letting us in. "Who wants to go?"

"I'm going!" Odd said cheerfully.

"Me too," Ulrich said.

"And I'll go. So Yumi and Emma will protect the Skid?" Aelita asked us as we ventured into the replika. We found ourselves in the polar region.

"Fine by me," I agreed. Yumi voiced her agreement and we docked onto the tower. Yumi and I de-energized from the skid and watched the others being teleported off the skid. Yumi turned to face me and asked about Odd spending the night.

"Well… we finished that film that we were making and I fell asleep on the couch toward the end so he carried me to my dorm like the amazing boy he is," I started. I felt a laser hit my shoulder and Yumi and I both looked to find the source of the attack.

"Ambush!" Yumi pulled out her fans and I jumped back, avoiding a second laser. Yumi flung a fan at the attacking blok and missed.

"Laser bullets!" I yelled and sent a stream of them flying at the blok. "Jeremie!" I shouted.

"Here are your vehicles! You need to protect the skid!" he cut off. I saw the Overwing and the Overmorph appear side by side in front of us. Yumi flipped onto her vehicle and I ran onto mine and we went airborne.

I assessed the situation; three more Bloks were coming in and I could see two Krabs approaching the area.

"You finish off the block heads! I'm in the mood for some shellfish," I told Yumi and took off for the krabs. There was one on each path leading to the skid. I approached the one closest to me and jumped down on top of it, holding onto it with my abrasive fingers and shot at its shell. As it started trembling and wobbling it hit me close up with a laser and sent me over the edge toward the digital sea. I called my Overmorph to me and it caught me. I looked around to see I was sitting right on top of the digital sea.

"Yumi!" I called.

"She's busy with the bloks," Jeremie told me. "Hang tight."

I saw the second krab look down at me over the edge of the platform and braced myself as he started shooting at me. I shot at him with my bullets in a futile attempt to take him out. I hit him once but since it wasn't directly on X.A.N.A.'s eye, it didn't destroy him or even do much damage. He also hit me, the only difference is hie hit me twice, and did plenty of damage.

"Emma, you have twenty life points left!" Jeremie informed me as I saw Yumi coming down to get me. She held out her hand and when I grabbed it she lifted me onto the Overwing and we went back up to the platform. I jumped off and assessed the battlefield. There were two bloks and a krab moving to attack Yumi and I.

"That will be enough for me," I told Jeremie. "I'll need the overboard."

Jeremie sent the Overboard just as two more krabs joined the party. I took off above the crusade and firebombed the krabs, barely taking two of them out. Yumi was working on the two bloks. One of them managed to freeze her legs in place and she was devirtualized by a follow up charged laser. I looked down at the last three monsters, trying to decide what to do.

One of the monsters took a shot at the skid and I jumped down on top of the krab and shot at it, jumping away toward the Bloks. I landed a shot at one of them while another one of them shot me with the freeze spray and felt my body freeze up.

"Emma, you're out for three minutes… I'm sending Odd back. Ulrich and Aelita are taking care of the super computer," Jeremie told me.

The two bloks didn't give Odd any chances. They both faced me and fired, devirtualizing me before Odd even got off the skid.

When I came out of the scanner I punched the side of the cabin, annoyed that I'd been devirtualized. Yumi was sitting in front of her scanner casually, when she saw me she stood up.

"I'm so lame, I can't believe I let those monsters devirtualize me," I said, irritated.

"It happens, we've all been devirtualized in one stupid way or another. Usually it's Odd," she told me. "So, where were we?" she asked.

"Oh, well…" I recalled the conversation we were having before the bloks and krabs showed up. "So when he brought me back to my room and stayed with me for a while. I was starting to fall asleep so he was going to go back to his room but I asked him to stay the night. In the morning after he left Sissi came into my room threatening me," I told her. "And you know that we fixed that, turned out she was just lonely…" I finished. We sat down inside the elevator waiting for everyone else to come back.

Odd came out of a scanner, looking as any rematerialized Lyoko Warrior would. He saw Yumi and I sitting in the elevator and came over to join us. "So what are we talking about?" he asked.

"Sissi being a pain in the butt," Yumi answered. "Hopefully she was being sincee when she said she would leave us alone and quit the blackmailing business."

Ulrich and Aelita came out of scanners a moment later. "Great job, everybody," Jeremie said as they walked out of the scanners. "Another Replika bites the dust."

"What if she's still going to give us trouble, how should we handle it?" Odd asked as Ulrich pressed the elevator button to take us up to the lab.

"Well hopefully she doesn't, she said she would leave us alone," I responded. "And I am choosing to believe her."

"Watch your back," Ulrich warned me. "She might tell you she's sorry but that won't stop her from fucking things up later if she's displeased."

Jeremie tried to explain more about replikas and we discussed what we thought X.A.N.A. was up to. Odd entertained us with a detailed plot to take over the world with evil spiders and spiky deadly balls and killer robots where he would enslave the human race. At the end of his enthusiastic idea, nobody found it very funny because it was definitely a possibility that didn't seem fun.

"I wasn't even being serious, just trying to lighten the mood," Odd said, rolling his eyes in frustration.

"All I know is we need to get rid of these replikas," I said. "Fast."


	47. Something Big

So we did, over the next three weeks Jeremie kicked his replika search into overdrive and the six of us spent the majority of our free time taking out replika after replika. Of course we weren't making much of a dent. Also, X.A.N.A seemed to be becoming more and more desperate to kill the six of us, slowing us down with multiple deadly attacks. Also, we had to do all of this while making a feeble attempt to hang out with Sissi every now and then to make her feel included. She was happy enough sitting with us during classes and studying together and stuff but I for one wanted to be very thorough with her. I invited her to go out shopping and stuff like that.

One Wednesday afternoon during lunch Jim was handing out mail and I got a letter from my father that was two pages long, front and back. He started off by giving me the horrible news that two of my cousins had been involved in a tragic drug store robbery.

"Two of my cousins were killed last week," I said quietly, dropping the letter. Odd snatched it before it landed in my bowl of hot chocolate. He set the letter down next to my tray and embraced me in a hug. I didn't cry or anything but it was kind of shattering in a big way; my two cousins Anna and Barbara were two of the closest family members I had next to my father. Barbara was actually my godmother. She was 24 when I was born and Anna was her little sister, being 20. They were both still pretty young. What made it worse was the culprit was still at large in town. My father was in charge of the team that would bring him down.

When I picked the letter back up I continued to read. More shocking news came and I don't think I could describe my feelings if I tried. "He and a few other members of my family are going to move to the United States," I told everyone. "This is kind of incredible," I finished. I folded the letter back up and put it in the envelope. "A lot has been happening there… I guess it's a good thing I'm not there."

"How do you figure? I bet they miss you a lot," Aelita told me. Everyone had their attention on me. I shrugged and looked at my food.

"My father is moving to America, I'm sure that if I was there I'd hinder his chances at making that clean start that he'd always dreamed of. He says that he is going to apply to go to school to become a business man and entrepreneur. I'm glad my coming here gave him the chance to do that. I'd be in the way if I were still there."

"You coming here is also really helping us in our quest to defeat X.A.N.A., guess you were just destined to come here," Yumi said with a smile. "You're a real blessing."

"Not sure if I would go as far as to call it a blessing." I shrugged. "But I'm glad I can help."

"So soccer season is starting up," Odd said, taking the topic of conversation off of me; he knew I'd appreciate it. "Ulrich, you trying out this year?"

"You bet I am, good buddy. You?"

"For sure, I'd be bored without it," Odd replied with gusto. "With the two of us, our team will be undefeated."

"Is there a girl's team?" I asked curiously. "My cousins taught me how to play and played with me whenever we visited each other. I think they'd be happy if I joined a real team; they always said I was good," I explained.

"Yeah, there are try outs for both teams next week. They run trial practices and scrimmage games for try outs and then announce the teams on Saturday," Ulrich told me.

"Maybe I'll try out with you, Emma," Aelita stated. "It would be fun and Jim would probably give me less hassle for skipping P.E. so much."

So the week went on. Jeremie barely slept and he sent a clone of himself to classes as he had been doing more and more frequently. When I asked Aelita about it she told me that he was working on a multi-agent program that could wipe out multiple Replikas at once.

"So how far is he? is it almost done now or what? He's been working on it for weeks. That clone of his is more of a flirt than Odd was before Emma came along," Ulrich said to us. Odd elbowed his best friend and took my waist defensively.

"It's almost done," Aelita answered with a grin. "I'm making him come to dinner tonight though. He's been skipping meals and I don't like it."

"He's been skipping life, actually," I corrected. "And I don't like that."

My phone buzzed then and I looked to see it was a call from Jeremie. "Speak of the devil," I said as I answered. "Yes, Jeremie?"

"Is everyone with you?" he asked.

"Yumi is talking with a teacher right now but everyone else is here," I said. "What's up? X.A.N.A. attack?"

"No, I just finished the program I've been working on and right when I finished I got a message from Franz Hopper," he said, I could hear the wind rushing past him; he was running.

"Franz Hopper messaged you? That sounds a little suspicious," I said. Everyone had their eyes glued to my face, their full attention caught.

"It's no coincidence. Meet up at the factory," he said and hung up.

I sighed. "Something big is happening, let's go," I said to everyone and we stood up. "I'll wait for Yumi and we'll meet you at the factory."

I headed over to the science building and waited outside of Mrs. Hertz's classroom. When Yumi emerged ten minutes later I filled her in.

"Franz Hopper can message us? I don't believe he would risk exposure unless he really had to… So this is either a trap or something big is going on," Yumi said seriously. "Let's go!"

We ran toward the gym, which was the closest route to the sewer from the science building. We entered the sewer from the secret passage and raced each other to the factory. When we got there Ulrich, Odd, and Aelita were already on Lyoko.

"Franz Hopper is going to send me some information that I need to help with my multi-agent system," Jeremie told us as the elevator doors opened into the lab. Yumi and I stayed where we were as he continued speaking. "You two get oon there and help the others protect him. X.A.A.A. is bound to send some monsters in after them. I'm surprised he hasn't already.

"Roger that," I said, pressing the red down button, sending Yumi and I to the scanner room.

"Transfer: Yumi. Transfer: Emma," he started as soon as we stepped into scanners. The doors closed and I turned to face them. "Scanner: Yumi. Scanner: Emma. Virtualization!"


	48. The Battle Wages

I found myself in Sector 1, the polar region. I landed swiftly on my Overmorph and soared high into the air. The first thing I saw was Ulrich and Odd in a brutal battle against the Kolossus and a shit ton of Manta. Aelita was busy guarding her father, Odd was firing at Manta, and Ulrich was climbing up on the Kolossus trying to figure out how to immobilize it.

"Holy shit!" I breathed. I made a snap decision. "Yumi, you help Odd or Ulrich, I'm going to go help Aelita."

I zoomed forward, above a threatening Manta and shot at its X.A.N.A. eye and watched it blow up. I gave Aelita a thumbs up as she held up her force field surrounding herself and Franz Hopper. I went after another manta and ended up having my Overmorph destroyed. I flew forward and latched onto a Manta and held onto it for dear life.

"Laser Bullets!" I cried and saw the usual flash of light before I jumped off. I tried landing on another nearby Manta but missed. I landed roughly and felt to a kneeling position and looked up as that manta charged a laser meant for me.

"Shield!" Odd shouted and leapt in front of me, blocking the attack. I got up and gave him a quick peck on the cheek before I rushed over to Aelita, whose force field was dimming and shattering. She ran over to a short cliff with her father and knelt down to avoid being hit. I stood above the two of them, putting myself between the monsters and Mr. Hopper.

"Hey, Einstein can I call my Overmorph back yet?" I asked. I could call it to me whenever I wanted except for when it's devirtualized by a monster, when that happens I have to wait a few minutes.

"Go for it," he told me, sounding like he was all over the place, trying to keep everyone on top of their game.

I called my Overmorph up and it virtualized in front of me. I hopped on and was airborne once again. I shot at an incoming manta and I held my arms up to shield myself as it shattered. I gritted my teeth, all the others had some sort of effective method of shields, I didn't. Aelita and I zeroed in on another manta and shot at it together, she did so from the ground while I did so from the air. She hit the Manta's underside while I missed completely. I sent another bullet at it and hit the target dead on.

I looked around to see how everyone was doing. Yumi got herself devirtualized and Odd got rid of the last Manta. We all looked in horror at the Kolossus that Ulrich was dangling from.

"Jeremie, I can't stop this thing!" Ulrich exclaimed.

"Hold on a minute… Get to the edge of the sector, I'm sending you all to sector five so we can launch this program. Ulrich, you're doing great," Jeremie said in response. Odd joined Aelita and I and we all escorted Franz Hopper to the northern most edge of the Sector. I looked back to see the Kolossus was very slowly making his way toward us. Ulrich finally managed to reach its head and dug his katanas through the eye of Xana, immobilizing it. He tried pulling his swords out but had no luck. He dangled from the beast's face, looking down at us anxiously.

"Here it comes," Aelita pointed out to the white transporter orb just as the Kolossus began to fall forward. We'd be crushed if the orb didn't make it to us in time.

Ulrich made a jump then, trying to reach us but came a bit short. He looked up at the Kolossus and tried getting up but the beast fell on him, devirtualizing him. The transporter just barely reached us in time before the Kolossus finished his slow descent to the ground.

The transporter sent us to Sector Five's arena, where the three of us stood, still surrounding Franz Hopper. I took a good look at him and wondered whether he was looking at all of us at once, or if only one end of his sphere allowed him a visual. I looked over at Odd, who was having his usual transporter sickness and he looked at me and nodded, we knew we couldn't afford to screw up now.


	49. Battle Improvisation

When the wall opened up, Odd and I led the way while Aelita held up the rear, forming a triangle around Franz Hopper. We found our way through the Core Zone until we reached the elevator. There were Creepers everywhere, I couldn't even count how many.

"Hey, Jeremie… can you possibly materialize me two of Yumi's fans? I think the more weapons I have the better," I said, bracing myself before going in for the attack. The creepers looked like they were about ready to start doing that.

"I can try," he said. "I've never sent somebody a weapon that wasn't theirs. Hold on, do what you can for now."

Odd gave me a look and then dove into battle, firebombing creepers left and right. He took out about half the creepers he actually fired at. His system definitely lacked finesse. I launched myself forward, calling my Overmorph and soaring above the creepers, firing and taking out as many as I could. I looked down to see Aelita seemed to have a good handle on protecting her father.

I looked back up and swerved quickly to avoid a laser but got clipped anyway. I cursed at the creeper that hit me and sent it flying backward with a laser bullet. Two if Yumi's fans materialized in front of me and I grabbed at them. Yumi told me how she usually used them and I concentrated, focusing and flung the first one at a creeper and watched as it sliced through the beast's head, devirtualizing it. I sent the other one flying at another one and came up next to Odd, shooting at a creeper in front of him. I grabbed the fans again and smiled at him.

"I took out ten, how about you?" he asked.

"I think I took out ten also, might be more. I don't count," I replied. He grinned at me and looked back at the battle and saw there was only one left. He looked back at me, challenge in his eyes and I nodded. We both raised our weapons, which were basically the same as each other, and took aim. Aelita's pink energy field got there first and the creeper shattered. Odd and I looked down at her and she smiled up at us and called us down to the elevator.

"There's one left! Watch it!" Jeremie exclaimed and we looked around. There it was, crawling down from a ledge we hadn't seen before. It fired and I ducked to avoid being hit. Unfortunately for Odd, he didn't do the same and he was devirtualized.

"Shit," I muttered and took aim at the creeper and avenged Odd. I looked back to Aelita and Franz Hopper who were already heading onto the elevator. I hoppeed on with them and we went to the celestial dome, the edge of the sector, and Aelita began her work on the interface while I stood behind her, standing guard. Franz Hopper floated out, hovering in front of Aelita and the interface and I could actually feel the energy he was emitting.

"Aelita, he's giving us the power we need to take X.A.N.A. out for good! Don't stop, whatever you do," Jeremie said giddily. "It's all up to you now!"

I could see a nest of Manta hatching and my eyes widened, there had to be at least ten of them. I called the Overmorph and jumped on, ready to fight to the death. I flung Yumi's fans at the first that emerged and watched it fly past the manta but hit the target on the return; the manta shattered. The rest decided to do some fancy flying work and I could barely get a good shot in. At one point I lost the Overmorph and just barely managed to take control of a manta and ride on it's back, taking out the manta slowly. I could see one manta shooting at Franz Hopper and I could tell he was getting weaker. Aelita was going between firing at Manta and finishing the program and she looked as though she would burst into tears from the stress.

I could tell she was trying to decide what she wanted more; X.A.N.A. gone forever or her father alive. I took out the second to last Manta, the one I was riding and took a shot for the Manta attacking Franz Hopper just as it made one last devastating blow, obliterating Franz Hopper for good.


	50. Bittersweet Victory

"No!" Aelita cried out and made one last swift motion on the interface. I caught her as she fell to her knees, shocked and shattered. I watched the interface screen as it raced and I saw a white group of light sporadically zig sagging around, splitting up in the celestial dome and through several tunnels and into the digital sea.

"You did it, Aelita," Jeremie said softly. "The Multi-agent system is destroying all of the replikas! It's destroying X.A.N.A.. I'll bring you two back to Earth."

I felt myself pixelate then and ran over to the scanner Aelita always used. Jeremie and Odd came down the ladder to join me; Odd took my hand and I squeezed his, feeling anxious.

Aelita's scanner opened then and she fell out, sobbing. Jeremie caught her and held her close to him and whispered his condolences and comfort. Ulrich and Yumi came down in the elevator then and stood around us, nobody spoke.

Jeremie spent the night checking for any signs of X.A.N.A. that might be alive but there were none, so we decided that we would shut the super computer off the following day. Yumi and I spent the night in Aelita's room to keep her company. Ulrich, Odd, and Jeremie texted us all night, offering whatever condolences they could think of for Aelita and she finally stopped crying and calmed down at around two in the morning.

The next morning none of us went to breakfast, we just met in the lowest level of the factory where the power source of the super computer was. This was the first time I've been in this room. We stood in a line, Aelita and Jeremie in the middle, Odd and I on one side, Ulrich and Yumi on the other.

"Does anyone want to say any words?" Jeremie asked, stepping forward, pressing a button to reveal the power lever. Yumi cleared her throat and stepped forward.

"We've had our share of ups and downs, hours of detention and hours of glory. We've gotten used to life with Lyoko and X.A.N.A. but now it's time for a new life without it." She looked around and smiled. Ulrich took her hand and she stepped backward.

I looked around, wanting to say something. "When I came to Kadic I barely knew any French and I was the most anxious, terrified little girl… You all accepted me and helped me in every possible way… and I feel like now I am much stronger after all of X.A.N.A.'s attacks and trips to Lyoko. I'm stronger because I met the five of you and I know we'll always be friends and I know you all would do anything for me, just like I'd do anything for any and all of you. I love you like family and I thank X.A.N.A. for giving us a reason to form such a strong bond."

"I feel like I might miss it, the fighting. I would hate for life to be totally boring now without X.A.N.A. to spice things up," Odd said thoughtfully.

"I wouldn't call a life where we actually have time for sports and music and parties boring," Ulrich replied. "But yeah, I think I would miss the heroics the most…"

"When I came to Kadic so many years ago I was the brainiac with no friends, after I discovered Aelita and the super computer, I suddenly had such great friends," Jeremie added.

"We'll always be friends, our friendship is so strong. Like Emma said, we'll always be here for each other," Yumi said with a smile.

"Time for a more carefree life, Jeremie pull the lever," Aelita said and took a deep breath. I took her hand and squeezed it to tell her we were all here for her. Jeremie stood in front of the lever and pulled it down. He took his hand off and it retreated back in, the door closing. The whole machine began sinking into the floor, lowering until it was just below a trap door, that closed and locked over it, I saw for the last time, X.A.N.A.'s eye. We stood for a quiet moment and then piled into the elevator, ready to leave the factory for the last time.

The factory was demolished a few days later, we found out that it had been slotted for demolition for years, but they never got around to it until now, it seems.

"That timing is incredible," Aelita said when we found out.

"It's like greater forces wanted to give us time to destroy X.A.N.A. for good before the building was destroyed," Ulrich mused.

"So now it's really done," I said. "We're not Lyoko Warriors anymore. We're just…" I couldn't think of what we were now.

"Warriors," Odd finished. "We're champions of the Earth, destined to keep saving the world. Instead of fighting virtual monsters we'll fight real ones, like bad guys and aliens and natural disasters, and zombies!"

I smiled and leaned my head on his shoulder. "As long as I'm saving the world alongside you, I'll be willing to fight off any threat, even if it's a fictional horror story monster" I told him honestly. "I'll fight by your side forever!"

* * *

**A/N: The End. Hope that wasn't too terrible. I know it was sketchy in a lot of places but thats because I was speed writing... I'm way too lazy to go back and fix it up. Leave feedback if you want to :)**


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